Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/323

 beached. A light rain was falling, and the white man crept along the side until he reached the stern, which was covered by a roofing of rotten palm-leaf mats. Then he squatted down, rolled a cigarette, and awaited developments.

Presently the soft splash, whisp—splash, whisp of a single paddle came to his ear, and a moment later he heard the sound of a canoe bumping gently against the side of the sailing-boat. Next a girl's figure appeared, standing erect on the vessel's low bulwarks. She called softly, inquiring whether any one was on board, and the white man answered her with equal caution. She then turned and whispered to some unseen person in a boat moored alongside, and after some seconds she came toward the white man.

"There is one yonder who would speak with thee, Tûan," she said, "but he cannot climb over the ship's side. He is like one who is dead, unless others lift him, how can he move? Will the Tûan, therefore, aid him to ascend into the ship?"

The white man loosened his revolver in its holster, covertly, that the girl might not see, and stepped cautiously to the spot where the boat appeared to be moored, for now he, too, began to fear a trap. What he saw over the side reassured him. The dug-out was of the smallest, and it had only one occupant, a man who, even in the dim moonlight, showed the sharp angles of his bones. The white man let himself down into the canoe, and aided by the girl, he lifted her companion on board. He was in the last stages of emaciation, shrunken and drawn beyond