As they walked along the dark pier the Governor asked: "What was that he was saying? I did not quite catch it."

"I heard only part of it," answered Bronner. "It was something about how queer religions may be—he was thinking of the juramentado."

Wade spoke: "Did you notice how hard the affair got him? Of course it was a pretty stiff sight."

"It wasn't that," said the Major, slowly. "From something he said to me to-day I know that he has had a horror of some day being compelled to kill a man—and the day came. I'm very sorry I didn't stop that Moro devil—yet I hit him three times."

The Governor walked the short distance to his residence. Wade dropped the Major at his bungalow, and sat oblivious to the Major's outstretched hand, musing.

"Major," he said finally, "Matak's selecting Terry for his master—queer, isn't it?"

"Huh!" growled the Major, "I would go with him myself—anywhere!"



CHAPTER V

NEW FRIENDS, AND AN ENEMY

The Francesca, no slower and no dirtier than most of the other steamers which ply the inter-island trade routes, had waddled all night and all day through the Celebes Sea. Afternoon found her laboring over a becalmed mirror of sea, past rippled reefs, through clusters of little coral islands from which straggle-plumed palms raised wry fronds in anemic defiance of inhospitable, root resisting soil. Mindanao lay to the west and south, vast, mysterious.

Terry stood alone at the forward end of the small promenade deck watching the third class passengers, who, though still manifesting the uneasiness of the Malay landsman at sea, were comfortably sprawled upon the dirty hatch covers enjoying the seven-mile breeze created by the movement of the vessel through the still atmosphere. Upon the cooler side of the upper deck the first class passengers had disposed themselves under the once-white awning. Two natives, a Tagalog planter named Ledesma and his big-eyed, full-bosomed daughter, had withdrawn themselves from the whites and were seated in conscious dignity near the aft rail. Four Americans were grouped up forward, stretched out in full length steamer chairs in the complete physical comfort born of a cooling evening after a blistering day.

Lindsey reached out to pull up an extra chair, beckoned Terry to join them and introduced him to the fourth member of the group, naming him as Sears.

He was a big man, heavy-set, a bit untidy of dress and beard: his face was flushed, and he answered Terry's pleasant salutation with a mattered growl. Lindsey moved in his chair, uneasily.

"Lieutenant," he said, "we want to get acquainted with you. We shall see much of each other in Davao."

Before Terry could respond a harsh voice broke in: "Yes, none of us are stuck on ourselves down here!"

The words fell cold. Sensing the purpose to offend, Terry straightened in his chair to face Sears. He met his surly stare squarely: their eyes battled, but under the level gaze Sears' bloodshot eyes wavered and lowered, the flush deepening angrily with his confusion.

Lindsey hastily summoned the deckboy to take their orders and by the time he returned with the drinks the constraint had abated. Sears, the only one who had ordered whiskey, settled back in his chair in sullen relief from a situation not quite to his liking. Lindsey raised his glass to Terry.

"To your arrival among us," he offered, pleasantly.

"To you all, sir," Terry responded.

"More hemp!" suggested Cochran.

Little Casey attested to his passion: "To breeds and breeders and breeding!" he grinned: it was his never-failing toast at the Davao Club.

They waited a moment for Sears, but he had gulped his drink.

It was the enthusiastic Casey who first spoke: "Lieutenant, and when do you think you can come down to my place? I want you to see my Berkshire boar and my two American mares!"

Cochran smiled at him, affectionately: everybody liked Casey for his wild enthusiasms. His latest hobby was the importation of blooded animals to cross with native stock.

"Casey," said Cochran, "if you would pay half as much attention to your plantation as you do to your mares and that old grunter, you'd get somewhere!"

Casey snorted: "Sure, and in about three months I'll have a colt to show you—then you'll sing another tune! And wait till I get some half-breed pigs—instead of the hollow-backed scrawny things we've got now—then you'll admit that Casey was the boy!"

Casey was more or less of a character in the Gulf. His words flew so fast they overran each other in effort to keep abreast of his racing ideas. Thoroughly respected for his sterling character, he was made the target of much good-natured hilarity because of his constant hobby-riding and the rushing speech that made him almost incoherent. His mares and boar had cost him money that could better have gone into plantation improvements.

The conversation, drifting fitfully, touched upon a new stripping machine which Lindsey had purchased in Manila: he was bringing it down in the hold of the Francesca.

"I watched them load it," he declared. "I took no chances in being shy a necessary bolt or belt. I'll have it set up in a couple of weeks and if it works as well in the field as it did in the agent's warehouse—no more labor troubles for me—no more hemp rotting in the ground for lack of strippers!"

Cochran was mildly pessimistic. He had seen too many other heralded inventions which worked well experimentally but failed in the hemp fields. Of course Casey was hopeful—it was his nature.

Sears broke his long silence: "Labor troubles, labor shortage! Hell!—there's plenty of labor in the Gulf—if only the Government wasn't always hornin' in on us!"

Terry knew the remark was aimed at him but refrained from comment. Sears mistook his silence.

"But no meddlin' government is goin' to interfere with me! I'm goin' to run my own place from now on—and get my labor where I please—and how I please!"

As this elicited no response from the patient officer he continued despite Lindsey's distressed signals. Emboldened, he turned directly to Terry.

"I suppose," he snarled, "that you were sent down to be the little fairy god-father to the Bogobos—to protect the poor heathen from the awful planters who want to make them work. No?"

Terry stirred. "Mr. Sears, I am instructed to protect the Bogobos from any oppression—and to aid the planters in every legitimate way. I hope to do both."

Sears' passion seemed fed by the conciliatory tone. Terry studied the convulsed face and through the thick veil of rage saw the lines of worry that had aged him prematurely: the black hair was streaked with gray and his hands were thickened and stained with toil. Moved by a quick sympathy Terry spoke again:

"Mr. Sears, this is no time to discuss the matter. In a week or so I will come to see you and—"

Sears interrupted in a voice hoarse with anger: "Terry, if any government man comes—snoopin' round my place—I'll—I'll—he will never snoop again!"

In the tense silence that followed the challenge Lindsey bit clean through his cigar. Terry's answer was so long in coming that the trio of Americans who listened experienced something of the faint qualm which sickens a man when he witnesses another's backing-down. Finally he spoke, slowly, his measured words scarcely audible above the muffled beat of the propeller.

"Sears, I am coming to your place first. I will come within a week."

Sears jumped to his feet, shaking with the hatred he had conceived for the young officer. Terry rose easily, looking frail in comparison with the burly figure opposing him, but he surveyed Sears steadily, unafraid, and not unfriendly.

Cochran coughed loudly, and again. Casey nervously undid a shoelace, retieing it with meticulous care. Lindsey rose with studied leisureliness and stood at the rail near Sears, ready.

But the ship's bell rang out the dinner hour, a waiting Visayan steward stepped out on the deck hammering a Chinese dinner gong, and in the strident din the crisis passed. Lindsey lingered to speak with Terry after the others had passed below.

"I'm very sorry, Lieutenant. Sears is a rough fellow, but he is half-crazed with worry. He's really not a bad hombre."

Terry nodded: "I can see that he is worried about something."

"It's his plantation. He has invested what little money he had in it, has worked hard for three years, and now that he has his first big crop he can't harvest it—the Bogobos won't work for him. He is pretty rough with them, I guess—but if he doesn't harvest this crop he's ruined. He's in debt—and pretty desperate."

He paused, a deeper concern crept into his face: "Lieutenant," he said earnestly, "can't you stay away from his place—a while—till he gets his hemp cut and stripped? He is really desperate—and always packs a gun."

Terry smiled his gratitude. "Lindsey, I am much obliged to you. You need not worry about it."

* * * * *

Neither Sears nor Lindsey were of the group which assembled on deck after dinner to enjoy the brilliancy of the swift sunset. The ship had swung through Sarangani Channel and was paralleling the west coast due north toward Davao. The red glory of the dying sun tinted the waters of the Gulf to the line of palm-fringed beach which edged the distant shoreline. From the shore the land sloped gently to the west and north, mile after mile of primeval jungle broken here and there where brush and thorn and creeper had yielded to man's demand for more and more hemp. Far inland the steady rise persisted, grew more abrupt and more heavily timbered, terminating in the far interior in a dim and mighty mountain whose dark-wooded slopes and misted crest dominated the Gulf: the red orb of the sun had dropped behind this towering summit.

Cochran pointed up at the distant mountain: "Mount Apo."

Terry nodded: "Where the Hill People live?"

"Yes,—where they are supposed to live: no one really knows ... you will hear all sorts of stories."

The shadows which lurked upon Mount Apo descended over the lower slopes, then enfolded the Gulf. The lights on the steamer shone murkily. The three lay back watching the stars brighten overhead. For a long time nothing was heard but the querulous mutterings of the old boat as she waddled on her way.

Terry broke the silence: "Where is Lindsey?"

Cochran answered quickly to head off the more explicit Casey: "Oh, he's busy—busy with Sears."

Terry understood. Cochran sparred for an opening in the silence his friendship for Sears made embarrassing.

"Lieutenant, you are likely to have work for your soldiers pretty soon. There's a rough outfit gathering down here in the Gulf—though I imagine Bronner told you all about it."

"He told me something of it, but I would like to hear more."

"Well, I don't know much about it, excepting that a score or more of tough characters have come down in the past two months. They settled on a mangy plantation up the coast, north of Davao, but they aren't working: just loafing around all day. They seem to be waiting for something—or somebody. The natives are scared, and the whites don't feel any too good about it either! You know we are scattered all over the Gulf—everybody a mile or more away from his neighbors—and that means a mile of jungle."

Casey flared up: "We ought to run 'em out—they're no good, probably carabao thieves or worse—"

"How worse?" grinned Cochran. "Horse thieves—or pig thieves?"

Casey did not mind being ragged by his friends. He persisted: "Lieutenant, you ought to run 'em out as undesirables or under the vagabond law! They're no good—they won't work—and they're the toughest lookin' lot I ever did see! Sure and if I had my way I'd toss the lot into Sears' crocodile hole—the dirty, low-lived, shiftless lot of 'em!"

Terry was interested: "Sears' crocodile hole?" he asked.

Cochran laughingly explained: "It's more or less of a joke between Sears and Lindsey: each has a hoodoo on his place that makes it harder to get laborers. The Bogobos fear a great snake they swear haunts Lindsey's woods, and none of them wants to go near a pool on Sears' places just below the ford—they claim it is the home of a monstrous crocodile, thirty feet long. No white man has ever seen either; it's a big joke in a way—but a costly one for them as it makes the wild men give their places a wide berth."

"What have they done about it?"

"Everything. Got up hunting parties—stalked the places for hours and days, tried to convince the natives that it is all bosh. But they insist it's all true, and stay away—and loss of man power means loss of money they both need this year. Both of them think the stories are just the usual Bogobo exaggerations."

Terry thought Cochran not quite convinced: "What do you think?"

"I? Oh, I don't know. It's hard to swallow the stories—man-eating snakes and crocodiles sound all right on the lips of the old Spaniards but where our flag flies things seem to sober down. Yet I've usually found that back of all these Bogobo tales there is an element of truth: and two years ago when I was clearing my place I shot an eighteen-foot python. Stumbled on it sleeping—glad it was!"

The evening monsoon had set in, rippling the surface of the sea and humming its cooling refrain through the rigging. Casey yawned heavily and went below to seek the planter's early sleep. Cochran remained with Terry for a half-hour, enlightening him with a running talk of the problems confronting the planters. He was well educated, progressive, and backed by ample family means had developed the best holding in the Gulf. He told Terry that on this trip he had succeeded in persuading thirty timid Visayan families to settle upon his plantation despite their native fear of all things Mindanaoan, and that his profits for the year would return him sixty per cent of the capital he had invested in his place.

"You will soon understand conditions, Lieutenant," he declared as he rose to go below. "Most of the planters need labor, and they need capital." He threw his cigar butt over the rail, debating the ethics of uttering what might be thought a criticism of his associates. "And they need farming intelligence most—too many of them were army men or government men before coming down here, yet they tackle a highly specialized form of tropical agriculture with utter confidence! They aren't farmers—they're just heroes!"

He half-turned to go, hesitated: "Lieutenant, you're going to like it down here—because we're going to like you. Now, of course it's none of my business, but if I were you I would keep away from Sears' place—he will make his threat good. He has it in him to become a pretty bad man—but as I say, it's none of my business. Goodnight, sir."

After Cochran had gone, Terry, sleepless, slowly walked the gently rolling deck. Ledesma stood at the rail near the forward lifeboat gazing into the soft shadows which shrouded the muttering ship. At Terry's quiet approach he turned to address him abstractedly in the liquid Spanish of cultured Filipinos.

"Buenas Noches, Senor Teniente."

Terry answered in the same tongue: "Good Evening, Senor Ledesma. A fine night."

The natives' vague fear of the dark—wrought into instinct by a thousand generations of ancestors who crouched at night around flickering campfires in jungles through which crept hostile men and marauding beasts—had fastened upon him, stripping him of the thin veneer of civilization the Spaniards had laid but lightly over the Malayan barbarism. He shifted uneasily, looked out over the starlit sea.

"Teniente," he murmured, "I like not the night. The dead rise ... some sing ... some complain ... drift through the black mists searching for those they have long lost ... the vampires seek for unprotected children.... I like not the night...."

Lost in the ghastly realms of native ghostlore, he ignored the American. Terry rounded the deck once and when he came again to where Ledesma had stood he found him gone to seek the cheer of lighted cabin. Terry stopped at the forward rail, his face upturned to the big stars which burned in the soft depths of the warm sky: the Southern Cross poised just over the crest of Apo. Below, on the black sea, the thrust of the vessel threw up a great welt which bordered the wedge of disturbed waters: phosphorescence gleamed like great wet stars. The tips of cigarettes glowed on the forward deck where members of the crew lay prone, exchanging occasional words in the hushed voices races not far from nature use in the still hours of the night.

The morning would find him in a strange place, among strangers ... he leaned upon the rail in a sudden excess of yearning for those whom he loved, summoned the spirits of those who loved him. They came to him through the night—Susan fretting, Ellis affectionately gruff, Enrico boisterously cheerful, Father Jennings wise, patient, watchful. Another, fairer, unutterably dear, hovered near him: he strove, as of old, to bridge the gap—and was baffled, as of old.

The eight bells of midnight roused him from his dejected reverie: he straightened from the rail. The Cross had dipped into the clouded crest: miles to the west a shorefire bit into the black mantle that draped the Gulf. The low wailing of an infant and the guttural endeavors of the mother to soothe it came up from the forward deck where the native passengers lay sprawled in the profound slumber of the Malay: pacified, it slept again, then the night was still but for the soft sounds of displaced waters and the creakings of the ship's old joints.

* * * * *

As he passed along the narrow, ill-lighted passage toward his cabin he heard a voice raised in ugly imprecation:

"I'll get him if he comes, the —— upstart! Just let him show his face on my place, by ——, I'll fix him!"

It was Sears' voice. As he felt his way down the dark corridor, he heard Lindsey's low tones, reproachful, conciliatory.

A few steps further brought him near Sears' door. Suddenly he distinguished a figure outlined against the door, listening. As a match flared in Terry's fingers, the native whirled.

It was Matak. He followed Terry to his cabin, unabashed.

"Master," he said simply, "he talk about you. He make fight talk—kill talk—so I listen."

The seed of his loyalty fell on ground furrowed by the lonely hours on deck. Shame at having given way to a great depression swept over Terry—friends were in the making, this splendid friend already made ... and he had come to serve, not to seek.... He smiled into the worshiping black eyes.

"It's all right, Matak. You do not understand. You go to your quarters and get some sleep."

The Moro lingered. "Anything more, master?"

"Yes, Matak. Don't call me 'master': call me 'lieutenant.'

"Yes, master." He left the cabin.

Terry, always a light sleeper, was awakened toward morning by a slight sound outside his door. Looking out into the dim corridor he saw that Matak was standing guard over his slumbers, armed with a big bolo whose naked length gleamed viciously in the semi-darkness.

Touched by the devotion and realizing the futility of trying to drive him from his vigil, Terry lay back on the pillow, the rhythmic beat of the propeller in his ears. Asleep, he dreamed, and the chug of the screw became the beat of an engine bearing him away from the home of his fathers.

The Moro heard the restless tossing and stepped silently into the little stateroom, his young-old eyes fastened upon the wistful lines that marked the competent young face. While he stood brooding over his young master the dawn streaked through the open porthole, and a soft splash sounded from up forward as the ship dropped her roped anchor. They were off Davao.

Terry had come into port.



CHAPTER VI

THE LAND OF HEMP

In three months the Gulf had laid its spell upon Terry. He had come to love the great slopes, from the sandy coastline to the last swift grades to Apo's distant top, the loveliness of the wind-tossed palms which fringed the water's edge, the sparkle of the ocean's blue expanse and its quick response to moods of sun and wind.

During the noontime hours the sun was blazing hot but he could order his work so as to avoid exposure. Out at daybreak, he usually accomplished the duties of the day during the cool morning hours, reading through the siesta hours in the coolness of his great open house.

Seldom did the routine of his work—the drill, the sifting of patrol reports, the minutiae of the service—overreach into the afternoon hours: then he was free to range the country, to learn its trails and towns, its people and its spirit. His big gray pony had become a familiar sight in every village, on nearly every plantation. Sometimes he was gone upon two-day trips up or down the coast, or riding the narrow trails through the deep green shade of the woods, his Stetson seldom touched by direct sunlight.

There was a never-ending pleasure in the hemp fields, great sweeps of tall abaca plants glinting in the sun: and in the sluggish, useful river which drained the levels, its turbid bosom bearing a few silent native craft, its oily depths suggesting a basis for the legends of huge crocodiles which no white man had ever seen.

He worked hard, but it was not all work. Many an early evening found him out on the broad Gulf in an outrigger canoe he had learned to handle with native skill, sometimes with Matak, oftener with Mercado, the first sergeant of his Macabebe company. Sometimes, when the surface was calm, he spent wonderful hours in studying the cool depths of the waters, the lee-shore coral ledges which bore fairy gardens of oceanic flora, brilliant-hued, weird-shaped, swaying gently in the tidal current: strange forms of sea-life moved among the marine growths,—some beautiful in form and color, others hideous. Once, while he watched a school of smaller fish playing around a huge sea-turtle, they disappeared as if by signal and the tortoise drew in his scaled head and sank to rest on the bottom as a swordfish swam majestically over the spot, then darted into deeper waters. There were clams as large as washtubs.

Often, while Mercado—or Matak—paddled, he trolled a flashing bait to lure the gamefish which swarmed in the depths. Rarely did such an evening pass without a long fight with a leaping pampano or a sea bass: with thirty or forty pounds of desperate muscle at the other end of a hundred-yard line, the song of reel was sweet. One night he brought in an eighty-pound barracuda but usually the larger fish cost him line, leader or spoon.

At times the surface of the Gulf was alive with schools of leaping fish: one evening he saw a great fish, a tanguingi, rise into the air with nose pointed upward, till, at a height of twenty-five feet, it reversed for a downward rush to plunge in the exact center of the ripples its great leap had created. Once, far out on the Gulf with Matak, he came upon a forty-foot whale asleep on the surface, rolling dreamily from side to side: the Moro, unafraid of man or devil, turned Malay-green with terror as Terry prodded the huge black surface with his paddle. Awakened, it upended in a sluggish dive, the heavy flirt of its great glistening tail smashing the left outrigger and drenching them to the skin.

Terry had attended strictly to the affairs which properly came under his control and in doing this and doing it well, had won the respect of natives and whites, a respect which had warmed into admiration among those who knew him better, into affection with those who knew him best. The loyal Macabebes would have followed him against any foe, and, better than that, they drilled hard and worked faithfully that they might be a credit to their leader.

The natives knew him as "El Solitario," "The Solitary," partly because he played his game alone in a quiet competent way, to all appearances equally friendly to all, regardless of color or condition, partly because he seemed unconscious of the lures of all those brown maidens known to be as shady of character as of color.

He had often stopped to spend an hour or two with Ledesma on his prospering plantation. He liked Ledesma's sincere, old-school courtesy, and he liked him because Ledesma was known as an Americanista, looked upon the Americans as God-sent to guide his people out of their sloth and abysmal ignorance. But he gave up these visits following a day when he found the dark-eyed, ripe-bosomed daughter alone in the house and learned, in her flaming passion for him, that she had misunderstood the reason for his calls.

The frequency of his trips to the outlying plantations had increased as the weeks went by, especially to the pitiful holdings of some of the poor natives. Malabanan's coming had been broadcasted across the land, and an uneasiness had settled over the Gulf, a vague fear Terry sought to allay. But Malabanan's record, a dark and dismal history of hideous crime for which he had been but half punished, was known throughout the country, and was the nightly subject of fearful conversation in every hut on every isolated plantation.

Terry had ridden, alone, to the neglected settlement up the coast where the gang of roughs had rendezvous, but Malabanan was away. A dozen hard-looking natives had sullenly responded to his curt questions. None were working, though he had arrived during the cool of the afternoon and the fields cried for attention.

In Davao, the town, he found consuming interest. Sleepy six days in the week it woke each Wednesday during the couple of hours the weekly steamer anchored offshore to discharge cargo into a lighter, drop a passenger or two, and send ashore the exiles' greatest balm—home mail. He came to know everybody: first the other government people—Lieutenant-Governor; Scout officers; Dr. Merchant, the district health officer; school teachers, native postmaster. Seldom a week passed that he failed to saunter into each of the Chinese tiendas, making the purchase of matches or other small articles the excuse for a half-hour's visit. Oftenest he went into Lan Yek's smelly little shop, for there the Bogobos brought their mountain hemp to trade for small agongs: tired from their heavy packing, they would squat down on the floor along the wall, one of them occasionally stepping to an agong to test it with deft contact of finger, all joining him in rapt study of its tone, measuring the duration of the lingering waves of sound. Terry learned, in time, that they found greatest merit in those agongs which rang longest to lightest stroke.

Even those timid Bogobos who never left the wooded foothills knew him. He went among them, studying their language, learning their customs and hopes and fears, listening to their picturesque traditions. Always, when he met a file of the beaded, braceleted folk upon the trail, he dismounted to exchange a few words with them. Unbelievably shy at first, in time they came to know him as word passed through the foothills of the young white man who understood: so they brought their problems to him, some pathetic, some ridiculous—recently he had ridden twenty miles to settle a dispute regarding the ownership of some yet unborn puppies.

As their confidence increased, they unsealed their tight lips in relation of strange tales of the Hill People, unbelievable stories of the wild tribe who lived in the forbidden mountain beyond the Dark Forest: stories told usually by old men and old women, who shivered as they whispered their legends to the white man by the campfire. They told him the dread stories because they liked his quietness, his slightly twisted, friendly smile, and because, as they told each other, he listened as one who sees not with the eyes alone.

When he saw that the fear of Malabanan had spread among these widely scattered, defenseless wildmen, Terry grew grimmer. But as the weeks passed peacefully by, hope grew within him that Malabanan's presence in the lovely, fertile Gulf boded no ill.

* * * * *

Major Bronner, arriving unexpectedly, found that Terry had been away all day on a mission among the Bogobos. Learning from Matak that his master would return within a few hours the Major left his bag and crossed over to the Davao Club for dinner. Entering the club, a roomy house furnished by the planters to provide a comfortable place in which to put up when forced to town by business or the monotony of their isolation, he passed straight to the dining room, discovering Lindsey, Cochran and a dozen others he knew. As he paused in the doorway Lindsey spied him and called him to the table he shared with Cochran and two others. After the Major had responded to the greeting called from all four tables, Lindsey took up the thread of a story the Major's entrance had interrupted.

"Major, I was just telling of my experiences with the hemp machine I brought down three months ago. As I was saying, I set the machine up in my biggest field and tried it out in private—and Man! How she did strip hemp! Convinced that I had the world by the tail I sent word out to all the Bogobos in the neighborhood to come in next day to see the machine work, and sent a special bid to the old chief who lords it over that section.

"Well, they came all right—ready to see the crazy Americans' newest devilment—and all set for the feast they knew I'd give! The chief came, with the bunch who act as a staff for him, and I lined them up right in front of the machine in the center of a crowd of two hundred wild men—all about as scared by the machine's appearance as they could be. I was pretty proud, and pretty happy: I gave them a good spiel through my interpreter, telling them that from now on all who worked for me would be free from the hard toil of stripping—nothing to do but field work—and all that. I thought that they would admire this new evidence of the American genius, would pile over each other in their desire to work for me.

"I nodded to the mechanic: he cranked the engine and it got off to a fine start and before throwing in the clutch that hooked it up with the stripper I looked out over the silent, brown-faced crowd. I had to grin at their expectant, half-scared attitude: the old chief stood right in front of the big machine—he was uncertain about it all, but game. I threw her in and waved to the feeders, who tossed in the great stalks as the big iron arms started to revolve in the air. It did make an infernal racket—but it did strip hemp. The fiber came out of one end, the juice ran into a trough—oh, it worked great.

"I spent a minute or two seeing that everything worked right, then I turned triumphantly to the crowd. But, Lord—there wasn't any crowd—I saw the last of their brown backs disappearing into the brush!

"All but the old chief. He stood right there; stiff with fright, I guess! I stopped the machine and went over to him to ask him to tell his young men to work for me as he could see how easy it would be for them, now that I had this machine."

He paused, laughing ruefully. "But I didn't get a chance to say a word. He took one last look at the now quiet iron monster, clucked that peculiar 'Tuk!' in which they express the maximum of emotion, uttered two words—'Americano devils!'—then stalked away as rapidly as his bent old legs would carry him. He disappeared into the woods—and hasn't been seen since!

"And worst of all, all of my Bogobos quit me, so that instead of cornering the labor market in Davao I lost most of what I had! I'm punching the bag every day now, getting in shape to greet the next hombre that tries to sell me a machine!"

He joined goodnaturedly in the laugh which filled the room and when it subsided turned to the Major gratefully.

"Major, my hemp lay rotting in my fields: it meant serious loss to me—it would have wiped me out. But Lieutenant Terry heard about it and without saying anything to me, went among the Bogobos and persuaded sixty of them to work for me—the most I ever had was thirty-one. He has a wonderful hold upon them—they will do anything he says: and I'm not the only one he has helped out; am I, boys?"

A dozen planters supported him, enthusiastic, vehement.

Cochran knew the Major intimately, his hobbies and aversions. He turned to him solemnly.

"Married yet, Major?"

"Who—me? I guess not! No petticoats for mine!"

In the laugh which rose over Cochran's elicitation of the bachelor's invariable formula, several of the planters moved their chairs near the Major's table. All of these quiet, efficient Constabulary were well liked, and the Major had been known to many of these Davao pioneers since the days when they had fought together against insurrectos, cholera, torturing sun, treachery; the days when capture had meant the agony of dissection piecemeal, hamstringing, the ant hill.

The Major's face had relapsed into gravity: "Lieutenant Terry is well liked, then?" he suggested.

Lindsey replied, earnestly: "Major, he owns this whole Gulf. He hasn't an enemy—not counting that gang of Malabanan's up the coast."

Burns, a gruff old planter, interposed: "He had one enemy, once."

Cochran understood that the uncommunicative Burns would go no further and thought the Major should be enlightened.

"As I was the only witness," he began, "I guess I must tell the story. One of our planters, Sears, took a dislike to Terry on the way down from Zamboanga: no reason for it—he was grouchy and sore, had been drinking too hard trying to forget his troubles.

"You know Sears, Major. His inability to get labor was ruining him and he went too far in 'persuading' the Bogobos to work for him. Well, he went after Terry on the boat, and it wound up with Sears threatening to do Terry up if he came near his plantation: and Terry quietly assured him that he would go there first of all.

"We were all worried about it for a week, as Sears is a bad man when aroused and never goes back on his word, and we knew Terry would go—he was all business, though quiet and white. Well, when Sears got back to his place all of his Bogobos had left him, the fields were deserted. It meant the loss of his crop, complete ruin, so he got to drinking harder and finally, desperate, brought in some Bogobos at the point of a pistol and put them to work.

"It was pretty raw, of course. Everybody knew of it that night. The next morning I rode over to offer him some of my men and as I came in sight of the house I saw Terry, riding his gray pony, enter Sears' clearing from the east trail.

"I was pretty scared. I knew he was there on business—that he would be the first one to hear of Sears' coup. I spurred up to see if I couldn't prevent serious trouble, but when I drew near I pulled up: there was something in his face that made me keep out, made me understand that I was an outsider in this affair.

"Well, Sears rushed out just as Terry dismounted, his eyes inflamed with rage—and with a whiskey hangover, I guess, though he seemed perfectly sober. He stood at the top of the steps looking at Terry, his face purple, trembling all over: he had his 45 in his hand. Terry tied the reins to the lower railing, then stood looking up at Sears with that queer expression which I couldn't fathom. Sears spoke first, his voice husky.

"'So you've come, Terry,' he said.

"'Yes, I have come, Sears.' He looked sort of small and white compared with Sears up there, but somehow I could not worry about him. I thought Sears would choke for a minute, then he said:

"'If you put a foot on those steps I'll—I'll—'

"Terry didn't give him a chance to finish the threat, but stepped forward. I noticed that his gray pony sort of nipped at him, affectionately, as he passed his head and made the first step up. Sears must have gone clean crazy. He raised the big pistol and fired pointblank!

"They weren't fifteen feet apart, but he missed, and that shot passed over Terry's shoulder and tore a great chunk out of the cantle of his saddle. The pony tore loose and ran away. I just sat there, scared to death!

"Terry never took his eyes off Sears and he still wore that same expression I mentioned before: he was white as a sheet but he was not scared. No, sir! Sears kept the pistol pointed at him and as Terry came up another step I saw the hammer lift again, but it eased back and the pistol wavered as Sears fell under the spell of Terry's upturned eyes. His face changed queerly as Terry kept coming, he stepped back uncertainly, the pistol dropped to his side. He understood why Terry had come, and I did also, at the same time.

"Terry was SORRY for him!"

Cochran paused a moment to conquer a little catch that had crept into his voice, and then concluded his story: "Well, Major, Sears realized suddenly what he had tried to do and looked down at the gun in his hands as in a dream, then offered it to Terry. But Terry shook his head, said something in a low tone I didn't hear, and they went inside, leaving me to cool my heels in the yard like the rank outsider I was! They came out in half an hour, arm in arm, and Terry stepped to the rail and sounded the Bogobo call. In about a minute a big gang of half-naked Bogobos filed out of the woods into the clearing and gathered around him at the foot of the steps.

"Terry talked to them awhile in their own lingo, then asked Sears if he had living accommodations for the whole bunch. Before coming to Sears' place he had spent the night in the foothills and persuaded seventy Bogobos to come in and work for Sears—Bogobos, mind you, who have always feared Sears and refused to approach his place!

"That's the story, Major,—except that Sears harvested his full crop, is on his feet again, has cut booze and treats his men as well as any planter in the Gulf. And he sure does worship this young lieutenant of yours!"

The Major studied the end of his cigar. "He never reports anything like that," he admitted. "I'm glad you told me."

"You'll hear plenty more such—" Cochran began, but was interrupted by the loud entrance of little Casey. He tore into the room, breezy, voluble, greeting every one with short, jerky sentences. He reached the Major last.

"Hello, Major! How's everything? I passed Lieutenant Terry on the trail—three miles out—he was leading his pony—said it was lame though it hardly limped at all! Tried to get him to mount and ride in with me—but he wouldn't—sure and he's the merciful man to beasts!"

He rambled on till the Major interrupted him with: "How are the breeding experiments coming on, Casey? Any foals yet—or pigs?"

The little man disregarded the amused grin of the planters, pouring forth in long eulogy of American mares and boar. "You come down to my place in about two weeks," he wound up at last, "and I'll show you! I'll have some cross-bred colts and pigs worth the seeing—and I'm going to name the first one after Terry!"

"First pig?" Cochran seemed serious.

"No—first colt—the first pig I'll name for you!"

Soon the Major left Casey capably sparring with the plaguing Cochran, and seated himself on a broad window ledge above the dark plaza, smoking thoughtfully. He had made no mistake in sending Terry here. Three phonographs strove against each other from different houses along the plaza. It is characteristic of the Americans in the Philippines that most of them take unto their bosoms these mechanical comforts, instead of the animated talking machines which the Spaniards affected. The sky was black with the threat of rain, low thunder rumbled in the west, above Apo.

A few minutes, and the Major distinguished two forms making their way along the north side of the dark plaza and as they passed under one of the oil park-lamps he recognized Terry, leading a weary pony which limped slightly. As the Major secured his cap and waved a cheery goodnight to the gathering, Lindsey hurried to the door to intercept him.

"Major, Lieutenant Terry promised to come over to my place to-morrow afternoon. We were going to have a drive against the wild pigs—they've been raising the devil with my young plants. You will come along with him, won't you?"

"You bet! I haven't had any shooting in months. But you won't let that big snake get me, will you?"

Chuckling, he left the club and crossed the plaza to Terry's quarters. Entering, he heard Terry splashing under the shower. Terry emerged soon, kimono clad, his face lighted hospitably when he spied the Major sitting by the lamp-lit table.

Dressed, Terry ate and listened while the Major smoked and talked.

"Lieutenant," he finally remarked, "there is no more trouble among the Bogobos?"

"No, sir. It has stopped—as I reported to you."

The Major regarded him closely: "What stopped it?"

"I just talked to some of the planters, and they understood."

Looking up, he flushed under the Major's quizzical gaze.

"Major, those planters at the club have been stuffing you!" he complained.

The Major gravely discussed Malabanan. "Terry, you may not have to move against him—I hope not, anyway. But I want you to be in a position to finish anything he starts. Do you want me to send you an additional company?"

"No—I can handle anything in reason with the Macabebes."

"What did you do with the secret service man I sent down?"

"I planted him up the coast where he can watch that gang."

Terry unfolded his plans for handling the situation should the ladrones break loose upon the Gulf, and the Major was satisfied.

"It hardly seems possible," he said, "that they will try it—but with only one company here to cover the whole Gulf—and in so remote a settlement—it may look like easy pickings. But if Malabanan dares—you smash him!"

The threatened rainstorm had passed to the north, leaving the night clear and cool: a strong breeze fluttered the lamp. Matak entered to clear the table and Terry, who had not eaten the fried chicken, pushed it toward the Moro with goodnatured impatience.

"Matak, this chicken is only half cooked: I've warned the cook several times—tell him to eat it."

Matak, silent and grim as ever, bore the offending dish out, while Terry turned to the Major to discuss the morrow's sport. In a moment their voices were drowned by the crash of dishes falling in the kitchen, then a fearsome shriek reached the startled pair, a moaning cry terminating abruptly in a choking gurgle. They sprang up and into the kitchen.

Matak was astride the prostrate Visayan in the midst of the broken crockery and bent tinware spilled from the upset table. He had the cook's mouth pried open in determined endeavor to ram what looked like half a chicken down the Visayan's gullet. Half-strangled and crazed with fear the cook rolled his eyes beseechingly.

Bronner raised Matak bodily and Terry helped the trembling Filipino to his feet. He turned to Matak sternly.

"What does this mean?"

"He would not eat it, master."

The cook broke in, almost hysterical: "Matak say I must eat cheecken, that you say so. I say 'all right, eat to-morrow.' He say 'eat now.' I say 'no, to-morrow.' Then he fight. I no eat to-day—notheeng—to-day church fast day!"

As recollection came of his joking instructions to the ever serious Matak, Terry turned to the Major but he had run from the kitchen, choking. Having patched up a truce between them, Terry followed the Major into the sala.

At sight of his rueful face the Major burst into fresh laughter. "His fast day!" he chuckled. "These Moros are sure literal-minded—they follow your words exactly. I've had some queer examples in the past year."

They sat through the cool evening talking of their multi-phased service, Bronner earnest and unwittingly eloquent in his summing up of its ideals, its hopes for the future, Terry silent and thoughtful as the big man talked about plans for Mindanao, for the Gulf.

"And some day, Terry," he concluded, after a stirring account of what two officers, Case and Gallman, had done among the Luzon headhunters, "some day we will get to the Hill People: the right man will come along, and the right combination of circumstances. It is an unusual combination—the right man plus the right place plus the right time. Carnegie would probably have been just a tight-fisted Scot had he lived in Napoleon's time, and Napoleon if born in this generation might never get a headline.

"I would like to be the man who first wins to the Hills. Think of the glory of such a life work—opening the doors for a benighted people and leading them out of savagery into the decencies and comforts and safety of civilization!"

The steady evening breeze had stiffened, swinging the great airplants which hung in the big windows. The far howl of a dog sounded through the dark: the sleepy crowing of scores of gamecocks accurately gauged the passing of another hour. The Major suggested sleep.

Terry, in pajamas and slippers, came in to see if his guest were comfortable for the night: assured, he crossed the sala, blew out the light and entered his own room, closing the door behind him. Shortly, while the Major lay watching, he threw open the door and the Major heard him climb into bed and adjust his mosquito net.

The Major mused: "That's queer—I wonder what he does behind the closed door?"

He fell asleep puzzling over it.



CHAPTER VII

THE PYTHON

Nothing could be more impersonal than the manner in which the Major inspected the company. He was very curt and official: no detail eluded his attention, no fault of equipment, quarters, drill or training escaped comment and correction. The command was in fine shape but it is a service in which there is but one standard—perfection, and perfection may never be attained. The inspection consumed the morning, but when they sat at lunch in Terry's quarters, rank had perished again.

At two o'clock they set off leisurely for Lindsey's, Terry quiet, the Major jovial at the prospect of a drive at the wild boar. They jogged through the hot afternoon over a trail winding under a canopy of foliage shrill with the plaint of myriad insect life. An hour out and the Major was nearly unseated as his pony shied violently from a three-foot iguana that scurried across their path in furious haste. Farther into the woods, and they drew rein, listening to the mystic tone of a Bogobo agong rung at minute intervals: Terry judged the gong to be six miles distant westward, the Major contended for half a mile, north of them. Such is the weird quality of the agong in the forest.

At four o'clock they drew up at Lindsey's roomy, thatched house set in the middle of his clearing and in a few minutes Lindsey, soaked with perspiration, hurried out of the tall growth of hemp ripening in his south field.

"I feared you might not be able to make it," he smiled. "You can never tell what the next day may bring you Constabulary fellows!"

He called his head native, a stocky Visayan, and ordered him to start the beaters out, explaining to his guests that they would take their places in an hour. The three then strolled through the streets of the little village Lindsey had built for his laborers and their families, a double row of neat bamboo huts, grass roofed, of which he was very proud. Returning, they passed a huge machine rusting under a rough shed, Lindsey's ill-fated hemp machine, introduced a little too early to an ignorant people.

Lindsey unlocked a trunk and brought out three high-powered rifles, two of them borrowed, contrary to the law of a land where firearms must be zealously protected against falling into hostile hands. He led the way through the long rows of abaca which drooped listless fronds in the quivering heat, and into the cool woods which surrounded his fields. They went on for a half-hour into deeper jungle, emerging into a strip of natural clearing from which they could hear the beaters converging toward them. Lindsey stationed Terry at the left end of the break, Bronner in the center where the shooting should be best, himself taking the right end.

As the beaters approached, crashing the underbrush and shouting lustily, the three stood motionless, guns ready: the suspense grew tense and the beaters grew silent as they hurried, unseen, from the line of fire. A moment of dead silence, then Lindsey heard to his right a dry twig snap and turning saw a big boar slip out from the brush and pause, its ugly tusks foam-flecked. His heavy gun crashed, the boar leaped convulsively across the clearing, falling at a second shot. As it dropped he whirled to cover a big buck which sped across his field of fire: as it fell he heard the cracking of a lighter weapon to his right and thought, as he shot again and again, that his guests were not being disappointed in their sport.

It was fast work while it lasted. Lindsey inspected with keen satisfaction the bag of two pigs and one deer that had fallen to his gun: he had missed one boar and another, which he had wounded, had escaped down the trail which led to his house. He turned to see how his friends had fared.

The Major was known as a crack shot but no game lay before him. Approaching him, surprised, Lindsey saw that he was absent-mindedly putting his rifle at safe the while he stared at Terry.

"Major, I'm sorry you had no chances—" Lindsey began but the Major interrupted him.

"Chances! Chances? Sus-marie-hosep! Some of those pigs almost ran up my breeches!" He was as nearly excited as Lindsey had ever seen him, and they had served together in a Kansas regiment.

"Lindsey, I'm sure glad you asked me to come—I've seen something worth seeing. I've seen him shoot!"

He pointed to Terry. His borrowed rifle stood nearby against a tree and he was busy clipping fresh ammunition into his pistol magazines. Five wild pigs lay in front of him near the opposite side of the clearing. Lindsey looked his unbelief.

"Yes, he did!" asserted the Major. "I watched him do it—that's why I drew a blank. Five pigs, five shots,—and after each shot he holstered the gun till the next pig hove in sight! I've seen good shooting, but such drawing—such certainty—

"Sus-marie-hosep!" he wound up, lamely.

Terry, having replenished his magazine, clipped it into the big automatic with a deft snap, and turned round toward them. Noting their attitude, he colored boyishly.

"Pretty lucky, wasn't I?" he said.

"Yes," agreed the Major, drily, "you were pretty lucky!"

The beaters had come up. Lindsey ordered them to carry the game for distribution among his villagers. The sun was dipping behind the hills as the three started back the trail through the dense woods, Lindsey leading the way and searching for signs of the wounded boar. Every few rods he found a pool of blood where it had paused in flight.

They entered the deep shadow cast by the spread of a great banyan tree from whose thick branches a score of accessory trunks were sent down to seek root in the soil. Rooting, they grew into smooth, heavy supports for the wide-spread limbs which towered above the surrounding forest. Terry paused a moment in the twilight of the tree, studying appreciatively the miniature forest of trunks parented by the one ancient growth. Suddenly a warning cry escaped his lips as he saw one of the long dark trunks, a foot in diameter, loosen from a branch where it hung suspended high over the Major's head.

"LOOK OUT, MAJOR!"

He leaped forward, expecting to find the Major crushed, but involuntarily halted midway in his stride as the heavy trunk, landing at the Major's feet with a slithering thud, writhed a terrible length into massive folds. No eye could follow the inconceivably swift contortions that wrapped the Major in a triple fold.

Two heavy coils prisoned his legs, a third passed round his back up over his right shoulder to curve to the trail in front of him and rear again in a length which terminated in a massive head poised six feet from the Major's blanched face. Demon-eyed, unwinking, its thin lips bisected the thick-boned jaws in frightful, moist grimace.

Lindsey, horror-stricken, stood helpless while the hammer head catapulted at the sickened face of its victim. The Major's free left arm, raised instinctively to blot out the sight of the living horror, took the terrific impact, then dropped to his side, paralyzed. Still bearing that hideous grin the flat head drew back for another blow at the exposed face. The Major, faint with the terror of his helplessness and the crushing weight of the quivering masses of muscle about him, would have fallen but for their dread support. His consciousness fast deserting him, fascinated, he watched the monstrous leer as the head drew farther back, poised. He felt the agonizing pressure as the great muscles steeled for the blow, and in the moment before his senses departed, heard two crashing shots that sounded from behind him. With the smashing reports the poised head thudded to the ground, the folds fell from about him and he slid down among the great quivering coils.

Recovering consciousness, the horror crept back into his face but receded when he saw Terry standing by him. Still faint and sick he struggled to his feet, leaning against the trunk of the banyan and stamping his feet weakly to restore the still numb legs. Terry helped him hobble over to where the Bogobos, who had come up at the shots, were grouped about the dead monster. Lindsey, kneeling to examine the head of the great reptile, struck a match to point out the jagged wounds that had shattered the base of the head.

"Cut the spinal cord," he explained quietly. He was as pale as the Major. "Any other wound, even fatal,—it's death struggles would have—I hate to think of it, Major."

At the Major's questioning look he pointed toward Terry: "He shot it. Pistol."

The Major surveyed Terry steadfastly, striving for appropriate expression of what was in his heart.

Then, "Terry, I am much obliged. If I ever—if ever you—I'm much obliged!"

It was dark when they reached the house. Later they heard the triumphant shouts which announced the arrival in the village of the men bearing the carcass of the snake, which had haunted the neighborhood for a generation. The celebration of its passing lasted far into the night. After dinner Lindsey and Terry strolled to the village to measure the python, and Lindsey ordered it skinned immediately.

You may still see the trophy in the Davao Club, its scaly length stretched along the molding on two sides of the library, where the Major asked Lindsey to place it with this legend:

This python attacked Major John Bronner, P.C., on the Lindsey Plantation.

Length................24 feet, 9 inches Greatest diameter.............14 inches

Major Bronner owes his life to the wonderful pistol marksmanship of his friend,

Lieut. Richard Terry, P.C.

The ride home through the dewy night stiffened the Major's sore muscles and strained joints intolerably. Terry called in the Health Officer, fat Doctor Merchant, who looked him over and pronounced him uninjured, leaving some vile-smelling liniment. The Major winced under Matak's too efficient rubbing of bruised areas.

"Horse dope!" he snorted.

Later, dozing, he waked to see Terry's door close and open again after a few minutes. Puzzled as on the preceding night, he fell asleep over the problem.

* * * * *

Governor Mason had dropped the Major at Davao while he went on to Mati, planning to return for a short stop at Davao in forty-eight hours, but as they finished their leisurely breakfast they heard the whistle of his cutter approaching Davao from the south.

"Wonder what's up," said the Major. "He's twelve hours ahead of his schedule."

They walked slowly to the dock, the Major still stiff-legged, arriving just as the launch was lowered over the side of the trim white boat which lay anchored a half-mile offshore. As the launch neared shore they saw the Governor standing on the stern seat.

He stepped up on to the little dock and greeted the Major, then turned his smile upon Terry, apologizing:

"I planned to spend a day here with you all, but have been recalled. As usual my departure from the capitol was the signal for a dato to start a row!"

A group of officials and more prominent natives had gathered at the pier. He shook hands with each, calling each by name, then gathered the officials about him in a brief conference which disclosed his grasp of conditions in the Gulf. At the end of the short discussion he drew Terry aside.

"No trouble yet with that gang of roughs—with Malabanan?"

"No, sir."

The Governor's face bore a look Terry had not seen in it, an unrelenting determination, a grimness: "Major Bronner has told you how I want this matter handled?"

"Yes, sir. Wait, let him make the first move, then move against them."

"Exactly! I want to demonstrate for all time that this province is as unhealthy now for criminals as during Army days!"

For a moment he studied Terry keenly, then his gaze traveled over the splendid vista of the Gulf appreciatively, mounting higher and higher till it rested on Apo's dim crest. A moment and he turned to Terry again, to find that he, too, was lost in a rapt contemplation of the Hills.

"Lieutenant, some day ... somehow...."

"Yes, Governor."

The Major fidgeted uncomfortably in the presence of the two dreamers. Two short blasts of the cutter's whistle restored the Governor's urban manner. In a minute he and the Major had said their good-bys and were bobbing over the little seas toward the ship.

The group of Americans and natives split up as they returned toward the town but Terry lingered at the dock watching the cutter as it got under way and raced toward the horizon, leaving a white ribbon of wake on the blue gulf waters. Three large bancas were approaching the shore, belated fishermen returning with the night's catch: a fleet vinta, bearing Moro traders, bore toward Samal, its little sail glaring white in the actinic sunlight: the morning air was hot and filled with the heavy odors of sea and shore. It was a fair spot, Davao, productive, peaceful.... He looked up the coast toward the north where Malababan had settled with his unsavory crew.

* * * * *

He spent the day at the cuartel, correcting all the little defects the Major's stiff inspection had uncovered. The Macabebes responded eagerly—they, too, wanted to be perfect. They felt trouble in the air, scented impending combat, and Macabebes thrive on combat. Sergeant Mercado, veteran of seven campaigns in Samar and Cavite, drilled them tirelessly, his eyes afire with the old fighting glint. And that night he donned his starchiest uniform, pinned on his bright service medals, and made the round of the tiendas, throwing chests at the black-haired girls behind the counters. Great fighting blood is usually great loving blood.

* * * * *

Terry ate dinner alone. The house seemed too big without the Major. Restless, reading failed of its usual absorption. After a while he took up a letter the last mail had brought from Deane and reread it.

DEAR DICK:—

Your letter telling of transfer to the Moro Province has just come. I had to study the map to find out where it is! If it means advancement I am glad—though we had all hoped that when you left Sorsogon it would be to come home.

Your letters are so funny, so interesting. You write such nice things about the natives that I am becoming fond of them too. But the other day I read an article written by a cynical woman who has lived in the Islands only a few months. I read part of it to father, the part which says that "the Filipinos are a worthless, shiftless, lazy people; improvident, untrustworthy and immoral!" After I had read that he thought a moment and then said:

"Well, Deane, people are just about the same as that around here!"

Everything is going about as usual around Crampville. They are tearing down the old watering trough in the square—it is a nuisance to automobiles. They had some trouble over on the South Side last week among the foreigners but Father Jennings smoothed things out. He told me that he has a harder time keeping them contented since you left. I learned from him that you used to spend a good deal of your time among them, that they idolized you.... Why did you never talk to me about such things, Dick?

Bruce is earning a great reputation but insists on staying in Crampville. He has been called to Albany twice during the month to perform some special operation. He finds time to run in on us nearly every day.

Susan and Ellis do not change: they are quite the happiest couple we have—though they both do miss you terribly.

You never mention the native girls. Are they attractive, lovely? Do not let one of them fascinate you. We need you here, Dick,—Susan and Ellis, Father Jennings, the foreigners—all of us.

DEANE.

His deft fingers fumbled as he folded the letter and locked it in the drawer. Vainly smoothing at the lock of hair which always stuck out from the crown of his head, he stared vacantly at the lamp shade, oblivious to the entrance of the silent, morose Matak, who carried the bottle of boiled drinking water into the bedroom and then went out for the night.

A hoarse ghekko lizard croaked its raucous six-song from a rafter overhead: a giant bat flapped through an open window, fluttered, crazy-winged, thrice about the big room and blundered through another window into the night: the low voweled voices of native passersby floated up from the dark street.

But Terry heard nothing, nor felt the scent-laden breezes which roused the heat-soaked town to life.... He was walking up Main Street again, with rifle and snowshoes and fox, of a Sunday morning just as the heavy church doors swung wide to the emerging congregation....

A strong gust flickered the lamp. He rose, slid shut the exposed window and returned to his desk. In a few moments he took pen and paper, and wrote.

DEANE-DEAR:—

Your letters come to me across the thousands of miles of land and sea, carried by sooty train and boat, buried in a dross of mail in prosy canvas sacks: I open them with the delight one feels when he brushes aside the mat of damp and frosty withered leaves to find the timid beauty of arbutus.

You think, perhaps, you might grow fond of these people? I know that you would love this Gulf as I do. The humid heat of the day oppresses me but little: I love the sparkling hours of dawn, the cool of the evenings; the great tangled stretches of green which clothe the slopes from sea to the edge of the mountains that loom gray in the distance, like the rim of the world. And I like the courageous planters, toiling that the world may have its hemp: the young-old wild tribes, emerging from their primitive mental shallows, a bit bewildered, pathetic.

Yes, I think that you would like it all, too, though—sometimes—I am not quite sure.

The mountains are not like our Vermont hills: more rugged, wilder, more—what shall I say!—unsolved.... Thinking of the home hills I can almost conceive the vast significance of the word "eternity": but thoughts of these primeval hills sweeps my mind backward, to the infinity of creation. Untamed, untraveled, mysterious by day as by night, they threaten as they beckon.

Nearly every evening, near sundown, I see a pair of wild pigeons homing toward the crest of Apo. "Limocons," the Bogobos call them—"leem-o-sahns": the word falls limpid from their lips, unaccented. They say the limocon never was heard to sing in the lowlands, and tell a strange legend that it is an oracle of the Hill People, its song a harbinger of good or evil tidings.

An old Bogobo woman told me of this one night, in a little foothill village, when the spell of dusk had unlocked her lips: and she told, whisperingly, of twice having heard the Giant Agong of the Hill dwellers, once when she was a child, again when she was grandmother to nineteen. I wish you could have been there to watch and to listen: sitting near the fire in front of her hut, surrounded by a circle of almost naked wildmen who moved, uneasy, she told quaveringly of how the booming tones had rumbled down the forested slopes, and of how ill had befallen her people both times; when she ceased, they stood breathless, their whole beings strained to catch the dread sound none but she had ever heard. Yes, she moved me, queerly ... I scarce know why.

I am lonely—a little—at times. But who is not? Yet I have my work to keep me busy, usually happy. Just now I am facing less pleasant duty—but it is, I fear, a work that must be done. It is good to know that one is needed, as I am here,—just now.

But never a day is born or dies but that I miss you all, as I love you all ... Susan and Ellis, Father Jennings, the foreigners ... all of you.

DICK.



CHAPTER VIII

THE STRICKEN VILLAGE

A week later, Terry stood at the window looking down over the blistering plaza. Davao was torpid under the noonday heat. Three carabaos grazed undisturbed on the forbidden square: another of the awkward powerful brutes dawdled up the dusty road, hauling a decrepit two-wheeled cart on which a naked-backed, red-pantalooned native dozed: Padre Velasco, the aged Spanish priest, waved a weary hand at Terry from his window in the old adobe convento. As he watched he saw the soldierly figure of Sergeant Mercado emerge from the cuartel and hurry toward him.

Entering the room the soldier saluted stiffly and reported that a patrol had just come in from the foothills with the information that a mysterious fever had attacked the Bogobos in the barrio of Dalag, that a score were stricken and four already dead.

Terry hastened to the quarters of the Health Officer to apprise him of the facts. He found him cursing the heat, sweating profusely, though wearing nothing but a thin kimono. A very fat man, Doctor Merchant, inclined to be fussy about little things but magnificent in big things, and thoroughly imbued with the idea that his work of protecting the natives against their own sloth and filth was the only interesting problem in the universe. Alarmed at Terry's report, he ordered his horse saddled and rose heavily to don his field clothes.

Terry expostulated. "Doctor, you ought to wait till it cools off."

"Lieutenant, disease spreads all the time—it takes no time off duty—so why should I?"

He came out fuming over a missing button: "Confound it all! I never have—how do you keep so immaculate, Terry? You always look as if you were on your way to a dinner or dance!" Wiping the perspiration from heavy jowl and neck he lumbered about the room collecting medicine cases, saddle bags, two big canteens, finally answering Terry's question.

"No, you can't go with me—if I need you I'll send for you."

Terry followed him downstairs and helped him mount the ridiculously small pony, then watched the sweating, cussing, bighearted doctor ride out into the sun on his errand of mercy. As the tough little pony bore his heavy burden into the trail and out of sight in the brush, Terry decided humorously that Casey was right—bigger ponies were needed.

During the afternoon the Francesca had limped in and out of port. Among his official mail Terry received a confidential memorandum from Major Bronner that erased the softer lines about his mouth:

Zamboanga, 12/18/191-.

Memo for Lieut. Terry.

Last night a notorious criminal, Ignacio Sakay, passed through Zamboanga enroute to Davao.

Sakay was identified with Malabanan in some of the latter's most vicious undertakings, was convicted of brigandage and has been but recently released from Bilibid Prison.

Sakay is not a leader but is bold and absolutely relentless. Among the natives he was known as "Malabanan's stiletto," and was supposed to do all of the killing.

You may look for immediate action from these men: Malabanan has doubtless been awaiting his arrival.

Destroy this memorandum.

BRONNER.

Terry read the terse communication twice before lighting it with a match and scattering the charred remnants over the polished mahogany floor. He passed a grim afternoon with the Macabebes on the target range, where the scorers wagged bull's eye after bull's eye, for twenty-seven of the Macabebes were expert riflemen, forty-three were marksmen.

He saw that Matak, serving dinner, was gripped in one of the smoldering moods that often preyed upon him. Though his attentions to his master were even more meticulous than usual, he moved with an air of somber detachment. Terry had often pondered on the history of the queer Moro and now he studied him as he cleared the dishes and lighted the desk lamp.

"Matak," he said.

The Moro came to him, his melancholy eyes fixed steadfastly upon the master of his choice.

"Matak, you know that I have never asked you anything about your past life. I am not going to ask you now, unless there is something in which I can be of help to you."

Matak faced his master, his brown features Moro-masked, inscrutable. A moment he searched the concerned countenance, then before Terry understood his purpose, the tight muscles of his face relaxed and he slid forward to kneel on one knee and raise Terry's hand to his lips in the Moros' final homage to an apo—a self-chosen master. Rising, he exposed a face stripped of its mask of Oriental imperturbability.

"Master," he said, "I tell you. No other knows. When I am small boy—twelve years old—my family live east coast Basilan. Very happy family, master: father, mother, sister, me; three carabaos we have, a little house, chickens, a little vinta in which to fish—everything Moro family want. We hurt nobody, just work.

"One night, very late," his face darkened, "men come. They steal carabaos, everything. My father wake up, go out to see, and they laugh—and kill him. I—a little boy—see them do it: see them kill my father—with bolos. Then they kill my mother—the same man—the same bolo. I see that, too: they say she too old, and they laugh." He spoke slowly, hesitating before each short sentence, his black eyes dulled with the terrible memories.

"My sister—she sixteen years old—they take her away. They take me, too, because I soon be strong boy to work. My sister—they say she pretty girl!" He raised his hand in unutterable execration.

"We sail all night, all day. Second night, I hear my sister scream, see her fighting with same big Filipino who kill my father and mother. Another Filipino hold me away, laughing ... always I know that laugh, master!

"She Moro girl, he Filipino, so she fight hard—she rather die. She hurt him, so he draw knife, kill her, and throw her in sea: then other Filipino holding me hit me with bolo and throw me in too."

He whipped off his thin cotton camisa and exposed a deep scar which furrowed his left shoulder. It had severed the clavicle, and improperly knit, drew the left arm slightly forward.

"I swim ashore, two miles, to Lassak. Next morning I take boat, find sister, bury her on beach. I, twelve years old, master."

He paused, a picture of implacable hatred and purpose.

"Master, I see Filipino who kill all three my family. He born with left eye all white. I know him any time, any place. That nine years ago. Nine years I no laugh, no sing, no play, no talk with Moro girls, no marry—just listen—just look; listen for that laugh, look for big Filipino with left white eye. Nine years I no tell anybody, just listen, just look. I never find.

"But now I know I find him, soon. For I know you help Matak, master."

He had read the distressed white face correctly. Terry rose, placed his hand upon the Moro's shoulder—the scarred shoulder—and looked down into his now emotionless face:

"Yes, Matak, I will help," he said simply.

Content, the Moro turned silently on his bare heels and padded out into the kitchen.

Usually Terry strolled the dark streets before going to bed, but to-night a heavy downpour kept him indoors. Outside, the square was loud with the drum-fire of the heavy fall on iron roofs, the rush of water through shallow dirt gutters; inside, the big house roared, the roof trembled overhead. He paced the floor, sleepless, worried with thinking of Matak's terrible story, of the Doctor striving to succor the stricken village, of Sakay's joining Malabanan.

There was another worry, too. Though there was nothing in the eternally verdant land in which he was living to make the fact seem real, the calendar indicated that Christmas was less than two weeks distant, and for the first time since the days when she had first intruded upon his boyish consciousness as something different, something wondrously dear and fine and unattainable, he had sent Deane nothing.

* * * * *

He was awakened before daylight by the arrival of a spent Bogobo runner bearing a note from Doctor Merchant:

Dear Lieut:—

Can you come to Dalag for a day? These people are panic-stricken, won't do a thing I order, won't take treatment, but are trying to exorcise the devils of disease by all sorts of queer rites.

I hate to ask you to come but your influence among them is so great that it seems justifiable to ask it.

If you do come, bring your mosquito net—don't fail to do this. The disease is mosquito-borne, and fatal if untreated. The temperature runs are terrific—highest I ever saw.

MERCHANT.

Terry rode out of Davao at seven o'clock, bound for Dalag. Within a mile he overtook Lindsey, who had spent the night in town. They rode together several miles to where the trail, soaked with the night's rain, forked toward Lindsey's plantation: the sun shone white hot, the earth steamed through its mat of decayed vegetation.

They drew rein at the fork, dismounted. Lindsey broke the silence in which they had ridden following Terry's brief explanation of his mission.

"Terry," he said, "you're too young for all this worry."

Terry's face relaxed into a slow grin: "Lindsey, how old are you?"

"But your work is different—and you are different, Terry."

Terry's bantering grin gave way to a smile of singular sweetness, the queer smile which deepened the depression at the corner of his mouth.

"Lindsey, I know what you mean, I think.... All my friends—"

He paused, gently discouraging his pony from its persistent nibbling at his arm. Lindsey waited, hoping he would continue, but Terry looked away, idly studying the thickly planted hemp fields that extended from the fork to Lindsey's house, a mile distant. The still wet leaves flaunted on great stalks fifteen feet above the wonderfully fertile soil.

"Lindsey, I wonder if you really appreciate what you are doing in taming a soil that was wild in jungle ages before Pharaoh's time, and making it useful to man."

He pointed to the huge plant nearest them; "The fibers in those stalks—I can see them, woven into a rope that may warp a steamer to dock in Tripoli or Hoboken or Archangel: or fashioned by happy Japanese fingers into braided hats to cover lovely heads in Picadilly or Valparaiso or Montreal: or woven into a cord which will fly a kite for some tousle-headed boy in Michigan or for a slant-eyed urchin on the banks of the Yang-Tse Kiang: or, somewhere, it may be looped into ugliest knot by a grim figure standing on a scaffold—though I hope not!"

Lindsey had listened in curious wonderment to this conception of his work. He thought it over, laughed.

"Well, maybe that's what you see, Lieutenant,—but I see wild pigs rooting up my immature plants, lack of labor, poor transportation, fluctuations of price, typhoons undoing a whole year's work—take my word for it, I see aplenty!"

Terry tightened the girth, tickling the knowing pony's nose till a sneeze compelled contraction of the expanded chest. Mounted, he seemed loath to go, and twisted in the saddle to look down at Lindsey.

"About what you said a moment back—that I was 'different.' All my friends have always been like that—wanted to look after me, somehow, though I can look after myself, pretty well. I never quite understood why they felt like that ... about me. So, I know what you meant, Lindsey. And I want you to know that—that I like it."

Lindsey gripped his outstretched hand, then stood at the fork watching the slender rider thread through the maze of the trail out of sight. Mounting, he started homeward along the edge of the field trying to interpret the strange appeal this young officer had exerted over him, this quiet lad whose very competence and cheerfulness he somehow found pathetic. He involuntarily halted his pony as solution came to him.

"Why, curl my cowlick!" he exclaimed aloud. "That's it—he was BORN lonely!"

* * * * *

Terry rode into Dalag at noon and found the doctor even redder and hotter than usual. The perspiration glistened on his hands and wrists, dripped from his fat face and neck, and his once-starched clothes hung limp from his rolypoly frame. Worn with loss of sleep and fruitless efforts to bring the frightened Bogobos to reason, he welcomed Terry weariedly to the little hut that had been sat aside for his use.

Terry took command, so quietly that the doctor did not realize it. A few brief questions elicited the measures the doctor wished put into effect, simple curative methods and preventive precautions. Understanding, Terry started out, but was recalled by the doctor.

"Lieutenant, did you bring your mosquito net?" At Terry's affirmative nod he continued: "It's a good thing you did—the village is swarming with nightflyers, and every one of them is loaded to the hilt with plasmodiae!"

The village, a mere scattering of crudest huts along the river front, seemed deserted, but from nearly every hut came the low wailings of the sick and the frightened. Noting that the lamentations had ceased a few minutes after Terry went out, the doctor stepped to the door and watched his progress from shack to shack, saw how the picturesque little savages grouped about him. They knew him and listened to him confidently, so that the parboiled doctor was as much disgusted as pleased with the ease with which Terry secured the cooperation for which he had begged and stormed in vain.

Under his direction they cut down all of the plant life whose upturned leaves or fronds held stagnant, mosquito-breeding water, climbed tall palms to brush out the rain water accumulated in the concave depressions where frond joins trunk, even twisted off the cuplike scarlet blossoms from hibiscus shrubs. They carried green brush to a series of smudges he lit to cordon the village against the vicious singing horde of germ carriers. Best of all, they ceased their incantations over the sick, unwound the tight cords they had knotted around the abdomens of the stricken to prevent the fever from "going further down," opened the grass windows that gasping lungs might obtain decent air, and swallowed the doctor's hitherto neglected medicines.

There were no chickens in the village, no eggs. The doctor bemoaned the lack of nourishment for his sick. So Terry summoned four of the ablest hunters and disappeared into the woods for an hour, returning with a young buck speared through the lungs and shot mercifully through the head. In an hour a big pot was boiling in the middle of the street that throughout the night the sufferers might receive hot soup made up of venison, yams, eggplant and rice, all that the village afforded.

Doctor Merchant, watching the transformation, marveled at the method of persuasion. There was no attempt at exercise of authority, no raising of voice, no gestures, only patient explanation, an assumption of mutual friendliness, a sincere and ample sympathy.

Shortly after sundown the doctor, exhausted with the worry and stress of the hours before Terry came, distributed his bulk as comfortably as possible on the bamboo floor, tucked in his mosquito net very carefully, and fell into a heavy sleep, too exhausted to await Terry's return.

It was as well that the doctor did not await him, for Terry spent half of the night by a fire kindled at the base of a big tree in front of the chief's abode. Seated on a stump near the blaze, surrounded by a ring of half-nude Bogobos whose timid eyes seldom wandered from his face, he answered their questions and erased the last vestiges of the panic into which the epidemic had precipitated the villagers.

Interrogation at an end, he still stayed on with them. The flickering blaze lighted the circle of little brown folk, each flare gleaming on an eye here, glinting there on beaded jacket or brass trinkets with which both men and women were adorned. The first mad panic had abated, but Death had stalked through the settlement six times in as many days, and they listened superstitiously for the stark Tread through the woods which hemmed them in. Each whispering wind that stirred the leaves overhead brought a deeper silence, each wail from delirious sufferers in nearby huts tightened the little circle.

The quavering gutturals of a half-blind old woman, wrinkled and shrivelled with a number of years no man could estimate, jarred the dumb circle.

"My years are as the scales of a fish. Each year has brought wisdom. Listen."

It was the invariable preface of a Bogobo legend. Terry stirred: it was the old woman who had told him of the Giant Agong.

"This sickness takes not many more of our people. The white men will stop it. Trust them. These white men are Bogobo friends. These white men are strong, wise, honest. White is better blood than brown blood. Yes. The Hill People knew this."

At the mention of the dread folk the group of tribesmen moved uneasily. A young hunter nervously stirred the flagging fire into brighter blaze as the old woman went on:

"Yes. The Hill People knew. Have you forgotten how the Giant Agong rang the night the Spaniards lost their girl-child?

"No. You have not forgotten. The Hill People took her—they wanted white blood in the veins of future chiefs. They knew what white blood means—the Hill People know!"

Curiously thrilled by the simple legend, Terry moved nearer to the old woman.

"Grandmother, how many years ago was this?"

"Years? Years? I know naught of your white man's years, but this I know—it happened during the rains before the dark-eyed white men gave way to the blue-eyed white men."

Interpreting this as referring to the departure of the Spanish troops, he gently pressed her for further details. But she was finished.

It was dawn when the doctor rose. Groaning in the agony of the fat man who wakes stiff from the discomfort of an unaccustomed hard bed, he sat up, then forgot his miseries in a new worry as he saw Terry asleep under the open window, wrapped in his saddle blanket but without the protection of a mosquito net. He cursed, stopping midway in his vehement outburst to cock his head at the absurd angle in which men think their ears function best. As he heard the ominous drone of the insects his experience had taught him to fear more than wild beasts, he scrambled to his feet with amazing celerity.

A light sleeper, Terry awakened and lay regarding him quizzically, enthusiastically dissecting the stream of invective the doctor poured upon him for sleeping without his net. Suddenly sensing the responsibility the doctor felt in having summoned him to the village, Terry explained his lack of a net.

"Doctor, I gave my net to the chief's wife: she—she is about to become a mother, and she had none."

"Hell's bells! What Bogobo woman isn't about to become a mother?" he stormed, refusing to concede the justice of the act. "'She had none'—and probably didn't use yours!"

He was facing the window, past which the chief, arrayed in all his half-naked splendor of beads and brass, sauntered with an air of confidence quite different from his terror of the past week.

"There goes the chief, Terry, all fancied up like a bathroom on a German liner! But he has no pants—why don't you give him yours? He 'has none'! You make me—"

He stormed on and on. Terry, still wrapped in his blanket, sat before him looking up with an absurdly rapt air as of a student at his master's feet. Merchant stopped to swab the thick perspiration from his face, laughed at Terry's humbugging pose, and desisted. Terry slipped on his shoes, buckled on the leather leggings he had used as a pillow and picking up his saddlebags went out to clean up at the river.

Finding on his return that the doctor was again genuinely disturbed over his exposure to the disease, he sought to divert him. He sneezed violently, and as the doctor listened with professional interest he followed it with a series which mounted in volume and vigor. Merchant eyed him solicitously.

"You've caught a bad cold, Lieutenant."

"Yes." Terry snuffled and drew his handkerchief. "It was awfully damp in here last night."

"Damp? How could it be damp in an open shack this time of year?"

"Well, it was. A regular mist!" He sneezed explosively, then took a few short turns about the little hut in search of the cause of his malady.

The doctor watched him, interested. Bending suddenly, Terry held aloft the perspiration-soaked nightshirt which the doctor affected.