20 
LAND & WATER 
May i8, 1916 
are. I wasn't bom to die pore. I was not. And now I'll 
sit in me kerridge and live as I ought. That's me. Me 
sittin' on the top of the keg and smokin' my pipe and Mac 
runnin' mad in the woods chased by niggers." 
Tillman, recovering, was also in a talkative mood. 
" We've struck it in the middle of the bull's eye," said he, 
" and no mistake. That's what pleases me. We aimed for 
it and hit it. If we'd tumbled on this thing by chaiice there 
wouldn't have been anything tn it, but we've got it by going 
for it. Well, it's champagne for all of us for evermore, 
Amen." 
" It's big luck," said Houghton, who was standing by 
Chaya. " But there's one thing tliat bothers me. Where are 
Wiart and Jacky ? " 
" That needn't worry you," grunted Hull, who was tossing 
coins on his thumb. " Mac's done 'em in as sure as I haven't. 
Went mad and done 'em in. Here we come and find him 
mad and them gone — done 'em in — that's what he's done. 
He'd a' spifflicated his own grandmother for haff a hapeny, 
would Mac, and here he was, alone with the nigger and old 
whiskers and half a million pounds." 
■ It looks like it," said Tillman. " Well, there's no use 
in talking about it. I'm longing to get this stuff under cover." 
Tillman had picked up the basket that Macquart dro])ped 
in his flight and they proceeded carefully to fill it with the 
gold in sight, a business that did not take three pair of hands 
long in accomplishing, whilst Chaya held the basket open. 
Then they set to, and in a moment located the next gold box. 
■' They are set side by side," said Houghton. " VVe won't 
have a bit of trouble with them, only we will want baskets. 
I vote we get back to the Barracuda with this lot and then rig 
up something to carrj' the stuff in. A piece of sailcloth will 
do at a pinch." 
•The others fell in with this idea. But, just at the start, Hull 
raised an objection. 
" I don't like to leave this .stuff alone with no one to look 
after it, and that's the truth," said he. " I ain't a narvous 
man, but it gets me on me spine when I think of leavin' this 
stuff to its lonesome;" 
" There's no one to touch it," said Tillman. 
" Maybe not," replied the Captain, "but all the same, I'm 
no happier to leave it." 
" I'll stay and look after it," said Houghton. ' Chaya 
and I will sit tight here while you two get aboard and bring 
back the canvas." 
■' I'll be easier that way," said the Captain. 
He started ofi with Tillman and they carried the basket 
alternately till they reached the deck of the yawl. • 
We'll stow it in the saloon as far as there's stowage room," 
said Hull, " and the hold will take the rest. Dash me, if 
I like stowin' it anywhere. I'd sooner keep it on deck under 
me eye, but that's not to be done." He lowered himself down 
the saloon hatch and Tillman was preparing to follow with the 
load when a shout from Hull down below made him start. He 
put the basket down on deck and the next moment he was in 
the cabin. Hull was standing by the body of Jacky stretched 
on the floor. 
" Good God '. " said Tillman. 
" Dead," said Hull, lifting an arm of the corpse and letting 
it drop. " Neck broken to all appearances. Done in by 
Mac. What did I tell you ? " 
Tillman was too shocked for a moment to speak. 
" How he did it. Lord only knows," said Hull, who was now 
as cool as a professor of anatomy demonstrating on a " sub- 
ject." " There ain't no scratch that I can see. There ain't 
no blood, just the neck broke. He may have tumbled down 
the saloon hatch and killed hisself, but that ain't probable 
with Mac about. Most like he was done in by Mac and the 
whisker man and then the whiskers got his gruel later on. No 
knowin'. But he's got to get out of here and we've got to 
shift him. We've got to rig a tackle to the main boom and 
histe him. Let's get to work. 
They rigged the tackle and ten minutes' gruesome work got 
rid of the intruder. He went overboard with a pig of iron 
as a sinker and the Captain, quite unmoved, assisted in the 
removing of the tackle and the rousting out of some spare 
canvas to serve as a sack for the carrying of the gold. 
CHAPTER XXX. 
Fate. 
Houghton left alone with Chaya, took his seat by the 
cache whilst the girl sat beside him. If ever any man 
realised his ambitions in life, that man was surely Houghton. 
The one woman in the world that he wanted sat beside him, 
all the money he required lay before him. 
", Chaya," said he, pointing to the cache, " that is what we 
came here for. We have got it and we must now go away. 
Will you come with me ? 
Chaya laughed softly to herself. The woman they called 
her mother had no more hold upon her affection than Mac- 
quart. She had absolutely never known the thing called love 
till Houghton came into her life. She opened out hor hands 
as tliough running over in imagination the whole earth, turned 
to him, laughed into his eyes and held up her lips. 
" That is well," said he. He held her hand and they sat 
shoulder touching shoulder, not troubling to speak. 
All at once Chaya started and turned her head, whilst 
Houghton rose to his feet. A voice from far away to the 
right came to them through the almost windless air. It 
seemed hailing them. 
" It is Saji," said Chaya, who had often heard that hail 
on their hunting expeditions. " He is calling to me." Slic 
knew by the sound of the voice that Saji was either injured 
or in distress. She answered the call and the reply came as 
faithfully as an echo. 
" Now he will know," said Chaya, " and he will come here 
as surely as the snake to its rock." They listened, but no 
sound came from Saji. That wily hunter, having obtained 
their direction, was using his breath, no doubt, for a better 
purpose than shouting. 
Then they heard him moving among the leaves and a 
mom<>nt later he appeared from among the trees. He was 
crawling on hands and knees. He held the parang between 
his teeth, for his girdle had been torn off in some violent 
struggle. He was mortally wounded and he was dragging 
along the head of Macquart by its hair. When he saw Chaya 
he cried out, and supporting himself on his left hand as she 
approached, he held up the head with his right. 
It was the gift of gifts, the love-offering of tlie Dyak warrior. 
It was more than that. It was the head of the man who had 
murdered Chaya's father. 
Chaya did not know this, nor did Houghton, nor did Saji. 
All these actors in the drama were perfectly unconscious of 
the fact that here Justice was dealing retribution, that here, 
above the gold for which Macquart liad murdered Lant. 
Macquart 's head was being offered as a gift to Lant's daughter. 
Houghton cried out in horror, but Chaya, just as on the 
day when she stood watching the battle between tlie scorpion 
and the centipede, stood looking at Saji and his terrible trophy 
unmoved. She knew that it was his offering to her, and her 
love for Houghton had told her in some mysterious way the 
secret of Saji's passion for her. It was as though she were 
watching not only the savagery from which she was escaping, 
but the whole of that mysterious past which lay on her 
mother's side, stretching through unknown ages during wliich 
men, to gain the love of women, had brought them as love 
gifts the heads of men. 
Saji, with one supreme effort, tried to rise to his feet ; then 
he fell on his knees, on his hands, on his side, quivered 
as though a breeze were astir amidst his muscles and lay dead 
beside his trophy. As he turned on his side they saw the 
cause of his death. The shaft of his own spear broken off. 
protruded from his side. Macquart, in his struggle for life, 
must have gained possession of the spear and used it with 
deadly effect, only to fall a victim to the parang. 
Houghton was advancing towards the body of Saji when 
Hull and Tillman appeared from among the trees carrying 
the canvas for the conveying of the gold. 
CHAPTER XXXI. 
The Escape. 
It was the morning of the fifth day after the death of 
Saji, and Hull and his companions were stretched on 
the deck of the Barracuda in the shade of the trees, 
smoking and talking. Seldom have men worked as those 
three during the last few days. Not only had they got 
the last of the coin on board, but they had proved to themselves 
the fact by digging up the last possible vestiges of the cache. 
They had got a good deal of the rubbish out of the fo'cs'le 
and flung it overboard after sifting it and now the boat was 
all trim and ready for sea. 
Pig-iron ballast had been jettisoned to be replaced by gold. 
The gold was stored in the cabin, in the hold and in the fo'cs'le. 
They had worked surrounded by an aura. The thing was 
fabulous and the labour like the labour in a dream. Nearly 
under them lay the bones of the Terschellin^. the sliip that 
had been taking all this wealth to China ports more than 
fifteen years ago. Its non-arrival had, no doubt, affected 
underwriters, caused talk, caused loss to the insurers of it 
and then had been absolutely forgotten. Here it had lain 
dead and buried to all seeming, but its soul had been actively 
at work, weaving, weaving, weaving, drawing lives together 
like threads to make the texture of the pictures that forms this 
story. 
It had drawn to itself Hull and Houghton and Tillman, 
Macquart and Jacky, Wiart, Chaya, Screed, and strangest of all 
it had brought up the past and dealt out Retribution to the 
wicked. Who will say that gold is a lifeless thing, or that 
