LAND AND WATER 
March 2, 1916. 
Tiilman went to the locker where the arms were stored. 
He had arranged with Screed for the arming of himself 
Houghton and Macquart. Tliere were three Winchesters and 
three Savage automatic pistols with ammunition. 
He brought them to the table and Hull, having cleared 
away the ch rts, the weapons were placed on it for inspection. 
The ammunition was kept in another locker. Tillman fetched 
the cases of cartridges and placed them by the rifles. 
Hull made a careful examination of the lot ; then he 
said : 
" There's a rifle and a pistol apiece for us three. Mac, 
here, is not a fighting man, Iiis business is to nose out the 
stuff, our business is to s and by with the guns. Did you ever 
by any chance see chaps out shootin' with a dog ? The dog 
noses out where the birds is hid and the chaps with the guns 
stand by to lire. Well, Mac's our dog — ain't you, Mac ? " 
Macquart made no reply for a moment, then he laughed. 
" You can put it like that," said he. " Well what 
more's to be done ? " 
The ( aptain loaded one of the automatic pistols and put 
it in his pocket with a packet of cartridges. Then he loaded 
the two others and gave one to Hougliton and one to Till- 
man, also a packet of cartridges apiece. 
" Being nearly on the spot," said he, " it's time for us 
to get ourselves in trim ; the rifles can go back in the locker and 
I'll keep the key." He placed the Winchesters and ammuni- 
tion in the locker and pocketed the key. 
As they went on deck Houghton recognised that what had 
just taken place was not only the arming of himself and his 
companions, but the disarming of Macquart. 
He took Tillman aside. 'The moon had just risen and 
was hanging like a great shield of burnished brass above the 
sea line. Banks Island lay on the port quarter and 
before them To res Straits lay spread in the mysterious light 
of the new risen moon and the waxing stars. 
" Tillman," said Houghton. " Did you hear what the 
Captain said to Macquart ? " 
" I did," said Tillman. 
" You remember Macquart's tale, how John Lant, the 
Captain of the Terschelling, took his ship up the river, cached 
• the gold and tlien sank the ship with the crew in the fo'c'sle, 
and how one of the crew, John Smith, had helped him ? " 
" I do." 
" How Lant married a native woman, Caya." 
" Chaya," corrected Tillman. 
■' Yes, Chaya — and how Smith did away with Lant, and 
then had to escape without the gold because Chaya suspected 
him." 
"Yes." 
"Well, Smith was Macquart." 
" It looks hke it." 
" Macquart it was that helped in the sin king of the ship; it 
was Macquart who did away with John Lant. It's as plain to 
me as that moon. My God, Tillman, if I had known I'd never 
have come on this expedition." 
" There's no use worrying now " said Tillman. " We're 
here and we have togo through with it even if we are bound to 
go hand-m-hand with a murderer." 
" There's more still," said Houghton. " I see now why 
Macquart let fifteen years go by without returning to look for 
that gold." 
• Why ? " 
" Why ? Can't you see. Lant s wife, that native woman. 
Chaya, was after him for his life when he escaped ; he would 
not have dared to return till she was dead or had forgotten 
him. He told me a yarn — he told us all — that he had been 
years hunting about the world before he could get anyone to 
join him in an expedition ; that was bunkum. The plain truth 
is that he had not the courage to go back, he was afraid of 
this woman. I feel it by instinct that he is afraid even now. 
But fifteen years is a long time and he reckons that she is 
either dead or, if alive, that she will not recognise him." 
" If she is alive, and if she recognises him, we'll never 
leave that river with our heads o> us," said Tillman. 
" You have put it exactly " replied Houghton. " But 
I'm not afraid of that. I don't lay much store by life, what 
daunts me is Macquart." 
" How ? " 
" He makes my stomach crawl, he seems to me now the 
incarnation of everything evil. I hate to be on the same boat 
with him. He's a nightmare." 
" He's not a bad imitation." said Tillman. "And the 
funny thing is that up till a few weeks ago he was a pleasant 
■enough fellow. He's been slowly getting disagreeable, some- 
how, though he has done nothing and said nothing much ; it's 
as if there was something in the sea air or the life a'board 
that has made the badness in the blighter ooze out without 
his knowing it — then this business to-night puts a cap on 
everything." 
" I'm afraid of him, and that's the truth," said Hough- 
ton. " I'm not funking anything he may do to me or to us. 
I'm afraid of him just as a man is afraid of a ghost or a devil. 
I've often heard parsons talk of Evil and Wickedness and all 
that, but I've never felt the thing till now. Yes, he seemed 
all right at first ; that morning I met him in the Domain at 
Sydney he fascinated me same as a fairy tale might fascinate 
one — but now — ugh ! " 
" Well, there's no use in bothering about that," replied 
the other. " If you're out on the gold trail you can't expect 
saints along with you, there's nothing collects devils like gold. 
The thing for us to do now we are forewarned is to be fore- 
armed. \Ve have to keep a precious sharp eye on this chap, 
for I tell you, it's my humble opinion he'd do the lot of us 
in just for the pleasure of the business, leaving alone the profit. 
He hates Hull like all possessed, and Hull's got the bulge on 
him. Did you notice how neatly the Captain has left him 
without a gun — Hull's a peach." 
" I tell you," said Houghton earnestly, " that though I'm 
afraid of this chap, just because of what's in him, the thing I'm 
really afraid of, as far as our success and safety go is, not 
Macquart, but the woman — if she's alive." 
■' Well, let's hope she's dead," said Tillman. 
He shaded his eyes and looked ahead. Houghton, looking 
in the same direction, saw a smudge on the sea and in the 
midst of it a spark of hght. 
" It's a steamer, said Tillman. 
He called Hull, who was standing by the wheel, to 
look. 
" She s coming up fast." said the Captain. " A lot too 
fast for a freighter, she's the Hong Kong-Brisbane mail boat 
most like ; well, them's that are fond of steam may use it, but- 
give me masts and yards. Now, there's half-a-dozen chaps 
in brass-bound hats aboard that hooker as'd turn up their 
noses at the hkes of you and me, but give 'em a head wind and 
half a sea and what are they on ? A shower bath ! Swep' 
fore and aft they'd be. I've had one turn as foremast hand on 
a Western Ocean tank and I was swimmin' most of the way to 
N' York. Look at her." 
She was passing a quarter of a mile away. A big white- 
painted boat, grey in the moonlight, crusted with lights and 
with the green starboard light staring full at the little Barra- 
cuda. 
A faint strain of music came across the water with the 
murmur of the engines. 
"They'll be after their dinner," said Hull, "with the 
ladies sitting on the deck and chaps in b'iled shirts smokin' 
cigars over them. I've been deck hand on a Union boat for 
a voyage, and I've seen 'em and I'd sooner be greaser on a 
Western Ocean cattle truck than first officer on one of them 
she male boats. There's some sense in qattle." 
Houghton watched whilst the big liner pounded away mto 
the moonlight and star shimmer of the night. That glimpse 
of civilisation was inexpressibly strange, seen here from the 
deck of the Barracuda, bound upon the wildest of adventures 
and surrounded by the wastes of the tropic sea. 
{To be cotitimtctl.) 
Some of the most unostentatious, but none the less 
invaluable war workers, are those women who go to the differ- 
ent hospitals one or more days a week and help to mend the 
linen there. Every day there is plenty of work in a hospital 
linen-room and help is always wanted. Expert needlewomen 
have rarely been able to use their skiU to better advantage 
than by keeping sheets, table linen, etc., in good repair. 
The latest way of arranging tulips is to place them in deep- 
stemmed glass goblets, cutting the stalk to such a length that 
none of it is seen above the edge of the vase only the pink, 
red, or yellow of the flower itself. The tulips are packed 
closely together, so that they are very hke a 'Victorian posy, 
and the effect is certainly an original one, even if it lacks 
somewhat in grace in the eyes of those to whom the stalk of 
a flower is one of its most beautiful parts. 
Once again there is a decided effort towards the crinoline. 
If it is not the crinoline in actual reaUty, it is as passable an 
imitation as can possibly be achieved in these days. This is 
brought about by means of the hooped skirt, the hoops being 
introduced just below the hips, and swaying rather gracefully 
with each movement of the wearer. 
The cold winds of the first months of the year will find 
an antidote in the fur-lined motoring veils which protect the 
ba k of the, head and the ears in the most efficacious manner. 
These veils are lined downwards for al)out a quarter of their 
length, and the fur used is generally squirrel lock on account 
of its exceptional ligh ness. They fit cosily over close- 
fitting hat, and make all the difference to the motorist. 
