punishment to being eaten by his companions in the bush.
"Close up Gogoomy kai-kai me," he said. "My word, me no like boy

kai-kai me."
Three days later Sheldon caught one of the boys, helpless from

swamp fever, and unable to fight or run away. On the same day
Seelee caught the second boy in similar condition. Gogoomy alone

remained at large; and, as the pursuit closed in on him, he
conquered his fear of the bushmen and headed straight in for the

mountainous backbone of the island. Sheldon with four Tahitians,
and Seelee with thirty of his hunters, followed Gogoomy's trail a

dozen miles into the open grass-lands, and then Seelee and his
people lost heart. He confessed that neither he nor any of his

tribe had ever ventured so far inland before, and he narrated, for
Sheldon's benefit, most horrible tales of the horrible bushmen. In

the old days, he said, they had crossed the grasslands and attacked
the salt-water natives; but since the coming of the white men to

the coast they had remained in their interior fastnesses, and no
salt-water native had ever seen them again.

"Gogoomy he finish along them fella bushmen," he assured Sheldon.
"My word, he finish close up, kai-kai altogether."

So the expedition turned back. Nothing could persuade the coast
natives to venture farther, and Sheldon, with his four Tahitians,

knew that it was madness to go on alone. So he stood waist-deep in
the grass and looked regretfully across the rolling savannah and

the soft-swelling foothills to the Lion's Head, a massive peak of
rock that upreared into the azure from the midmost centre of

Guadalcanar, a landmark used for bearings by every coasting
mariner, a mountain as yet untrod by the foot of a white man.

That night, after dinner, Sheldon and Joan were playing billiards,
when Satan barked in the compound, and Lalaperu, sent to see,

brought back a tired and travel-stained native, who wanted to talk
with the "big fella white marster." It was only the man's

insistence that procured him admittance at such an hour. Sheldon
went out on the veranda to see him, and at first glance at the

gaunt features and wasted body of the man knew that his errand was
likely to prove important. Nevertheless, Sheldon demanded roughly,

-
"What name you come along house belong me sun he go down?"

"Me Charley," the man muttered apologetically and wearily. "Me
stop along Binu."

"Ah, Binu Charley, eh? Well, what name you talk along me? What
place big fella marster along white man he stop?"

Joan and Sheldon together listened to the tale Binu Charley had
brought. He described Tudor's expedition up the Balesuna; the

dragging of the boats up the rapids; the passage up the river where
it threaded the grass-lands; the innumerable washings of gravel by

the white men in search of gold; the first rolling foothills; the
man-traps of spear-staked pits in the jungle trails; the first

meeting with the bushmen, who had never seen tobacco, and knew not
the virtues of smoking; their friendliness; the deeper penetration

of the interior around the flanks of the Lion's Head; the bush-
sores and the fevers of the white men, and their madness in

trusting the bushmen.
"Allee time I talk along white fella marster," he said. "Me talk,

'That fella bushman he look 'm eye belong him. He savvee too much.
S'pose musket he stop along you, that fella bushman he too much

good friend along you. Allee time he look sharp eye belong him.
S'pose musket he no stop along you, my word, that fella bushman he

chop 'm off head belong you. He kai-kai you altogether.'"
But the patience of the bushmen had exceeded that of the white men.

The weeks had gone by, and no overt acts had been attempted. The
bushmen swarmed in the camp in increasing numbers, and they were

always making presents of yams and taro, of pig and fowl, and of
wild fruits and vegetables. Whenever the gold-hunters moved their

camp, the bushmen volunteered to carry the luggage. And the white
men waxed ever more careless. They grew weary prospecting, and at

the same time carrying their rifles and the heavy cartridge-belts,
and the practice began of leaving their weapons behind them in

camp.
"I tell 'm plenty fella white marster look sharp eye belong him.

And plenty fella white marster make 'm big laugh along me, say Binu
Charley allee same pickaninny--my word, they speak along me allee

same pickaninny."
Came the morning when Binu Charley noticed that the women and

children had disappeared. Tudor, at the time, was lying in a
stupor with fever in a late camp five miles away, the main camp

having moved on those five miles in order to prospect an outcrop of
likely quartz. Binu Charley was midway between the two camps when

the absence of the women and children struck him as suspicious.
"My word," he said, "me t'ink like hell. Him black Mary, him

pickaninny, walk about long way big bit. What name? Me savvee too
much trouble close up. Me fright like hell. Me run. My word, me

run."
Tudor, quite unconscious, was slung across his shoulder, and

carried a mile down the trail. Here, hiding new trail, Binu
Charley had carried him for a quarter of a mile into the heart of

the deepest jungle, and hidden him in a big banyan tree. Returning
to try to save the rifles and personal outfit, Binu Charley had

seen a party of bushmen trotting down the trail, and had hidden in
the bush. Here, and from the direction of the main camp, he had

heard two rifle shots. And that was all. He had never seen the
white men again, nor had he ventured near their old camp. He had

gone back to Tudor, and hidden with him for a week, living on wild
fruits and the few pigeons and cockatoos he had been able to shoot

with bow and arrow. Then he had journeyed down to Berande to bring
the news. Tudor, he said, was very sick, lying unconscious for

days at a time, and, when in his right mind, too weak to help
himself.

"What name you no kill 'm that big fella marster?" Joan demanded.
"He have 'm good fella musket, plenty calico, plenty tobacco,

plenty knife-fee, and two fella pickaninny musket shoot quick,
bang-bang-bang--just like that."

The black smiled cunningly.
"Me savvee too much. S'pose me kill 'm big fella marster, bimeby

plenty white fella marster walk about Binu cross like hell. 'What
name this fellow musket?' those plenty fella white marster talk 'm

along me. My word, Binu Charley finish altogether. S'pose me kill
'm him, no good along me. Plenty white fella marster cross along

me. S'pose me no kill 'm him, bimeby he give me plenty tobacco,
plenty calico, plenty everything too much."

"There is only the one thing to do," Sheldon said to Joan.
She drummed with her hand and waited, while Binu Charley gazed

wearily at her with unblinking eyes.
"I'll start the first thing in the morning," Sheldon said.

"We'll start," she corrected. "I can get twice as much out of my
Tahitians as you can, and, besides, one white should never be alone

under such circumstances."
He shrugged his shoulders in token, not of consent, but of

surrender, knowing the uselessness of attempting to argue the
question with her, and consoling himself with the reflection that

heaven alone knew what adventures she was liable to engage in if
left alone on Berande for a week. He clapped his hands, and for

the next quarter of an hour the house-boys were kept busy carrying
messages to the barracks. A man was sent to Balesuna village to

command old Seelee's immediate presence. A boat's-crew was started