Misfortune!

By “Master Zack”

Ahead, the river valley stretched for a hundred miles to the coast, and Lae.

Pangs of scrub thrust down from the mountains on both sides into the ex panse of coarse grass, so that, seen some times from the air, the valley looked like the snarling mouth of a dog.

Heat haze, and the smoke of grass fires gave the sky a muddy, half cast colour. Underfoot was sand, and blistering stones, on which boots slipped and twisted, making the act of walking an ordeal.

Jimmy limped along, automatically following the track of boulders muddied by the passage of many feet through the flood pools. It weaved in and out through the “pit-pit” like a wanton stream; some times the rasping saw-edged blades met overhead, forming a steamy tunnel.

Depression and defeat took possession of his mind, will-less and doped with the drudgery of thoughtless plodding: “Three lousy weeks of walking and talking, and forbearance with cheeky ‘kanakas’ and not one recruit to show for it all!”

With nothing of interest to distract, every impression added to his burden; glare, sweat, lagging carriers, overdue ac counts waiting at the coast. He allowed himself to stumble, then straightened up, and for a dozen yards stepped with studied precision, only to lapse again.

At the turn of the track, the mumbling of the river increased to a delightfully liquid rush of sound, but the reality be lied its cool promise. Soupy and swift, it rushed over the gravelly bed between ramparts of “pit-pit”.

Cool water slipped between blistering leather and bruised skin. Side on to the current, he started diagonally across.

Thigh deep, and the loose swirling gravel filled his boots; waist deep, and he be gan to run in the stream, edging towards the bank; then up to his armpits-, and boiling over big boulders. Only to keep up right, and get a touch of the bottom now and then, and he would be right; he should have waited for the carriers to show him the ford. Faster now, round a bend, and he was swept under the over hanging bank. Deep here, and the boots that helped him in the shallows now dragged him down. Frantic paddling hands failed to keep his head up. His hat floated off.

It was in the little corrugated-iron “booser” at Lae. Jimmy took a long suck at his glass, and put it down with a gasp.

“Golly, that’s good!”

He was slightly “-err molo”, as he leaned back luxuriously against the bar counter and cocked an optimistic eye on his listeners. “Next thing I knew, I was lying on the bank throwing out water; it had a bloody awful taste. The boss-boy had hopped in after me and pulled me out. When I realise how near I was to the finish of all my worries—after going through the whole works, mind you—l could have shot him.”

There was a long pause, while the level In the glasses sank appreciably. Then: “Why didn’t you jump in again?” asked one.

“Well, you see”, with the earnestness of conviction, “the beggar would only have pulled me out again, Harry. Boy!

Two bottle beer ’e come!”

Mr. G. Sharland has been appointed second engineer on the Melanesian Mis sion’s vessel ‘‘Southern Cross”.