Beatrice Grimshaw

“ Blood brings sharks!” was the thought that beat upon my brain, as I flapped forward to give him help. Dulled as my senses were by the pressure of the sea, what I saw nearly drove me out of my mind with horror. A tridacna had got him.
It was set in a hole of the coral, its two fearful zigzag edges lying almost even with the surrounding level. It had been gaping open until the diver fell back upon it, and the clang that had struck upon my helmet was the sound of its ponderous shells, each some quarter ton in weight, slamming shut. ”

“ I stood and listened. At first I could only hear the word for “sorcerer” coming in again and again, mingled with “Kata- Kata”—the name of the district where we had first met with the wonderful diamond that the Marquis and I were now pursuing. Then the chanting became clearer:
“Aaaaa-yah, Mo is dead. Mo is dead and buried, and his spirit walks about and bites men as they sleep. Aaaaaaah-yah!
“Aaaaa-yah, ah-yah-yah, Mo, the great sorcerer, did not take his charm. Ah-yah, ah-yah, he took it before, and he did not die. Aaaaaa! when he did not take it, he died. ”

“ There was a native singing on the beach below the hotel: the day was hot and windless, and one could hear every sound. No one who has ever lived in Papua will want to be told why I could not go on with my mail.
For the benefit of those who have not, I may explain that, of all maddening sounds ever invented by the malice or ingenuity of man, Papuan solo-singing is a long way the worst. The choral singing is noisy and not very musical, but it lacks the brain-destroying texture of the solo. ”

“ But on this occasion the singer was invisible, down on the beach, and out of clam-shot, also out of boot, stove-lifter, jug, and tomahawk shot. The only thing was to go and find him.... Down the stairs, through the bar, and out across the glaring sandy street, where the shadows of the palms were faint and feeble, in the cruel midday sun.... The scrap of bush that shaded the sea-beach concealed me as I stole along. I meant to catch him at it.
“Yah-yah aaaaaaaaaaah-yah, yah-yah aaaaaah, yah-ah, yah-ah!” burst forth another preliminary yell. I halted for a minute to locate the sound. ”

“ I declare I stood with the stone in my hand and thought—I do not know what I thought: something mad, if madness it be to think as other men do not. Whether I should have gone beyond thinking or not! I can not say. I did not get the chance. For, just as I had taken the diamond out of my bag, something happened that made me drop it back again in frantic haste and tug at my signal-cord as hard as I could. ”

“ At the ends of those two threads, far down among the coral and the sponges and the beds of weed and shell, crept all alone at the bottom of the sea two men, one with the ransom of a king hung round his neck, the other...
What was the other doing?
I did not mean to be very long finding out.
“Run us up as close to the Gertrude as you can, without interfering,” I said.
The captain worked a little nearer. “That's about as far as I can go,” he said. “And now I'm going to send my diver down. You and his lordship can see everything beautiful. ”

“ I made my way as close as I dared, keeping my life-line and air-tube well out of the way, and snatched at the arm of the nearest diver. But in the unfamiliar medium of the water I missed; and the fight went on, the two dark monsters, with their round metal heads and hideous huge glass eyes, dodging, slipping, striking.... I saw now, with a thrill of horror, that both were using their knives, or trying to. They had an immense advantage over me, in being accustomed to the water; they moved easily where I could hardly stir for fear of losing my balance. ”

“ Most white men pay no more attention to native singing than they pay to a howling dog. If the singing or the howling annoys you, you throw something at the disturber of your peace: that is all.
Further, if any one did hear it and take notice of it, there was nothing dangerous in the song—unless one had the clue—the knowledge of what the charm really was. Had any one the clue save myself and the Marquis? Had George the Greek—who had dug Mo out of his grave, to get his diving-dress? Impossible. ”

“ Papuans aren't no pearl-stealers. They'll steal food, or clothes, or tools, but pearls—they haven't no use for them, and they're not sharp enough to smuggle and sell them.”
I had learned almost as much as I wanted now. The rest, though I did not hear it from Joe Gilbert till later, I will tell here. The Greek had “shadowed” the Papuan down to the boat, on which both were engaged. He had got close to him during the run out, and tried to examine the curio-bag that the Papuan carried round his neck. ”

“ An idle Papuan native (and a Papuan is always idle, unless some one is making him work) seems able to pass away half a day, at any time, chanting his own autobiography, and the history of his immediate friends, in a long-drawn nasal howl that holds one note till you feel the very substance of your brain giving way under its hideous boring—and then takes a sudden gimlet twist. ”

“ At this point you get up, saying things that in all likelihood do no credit to your education and upbringing, and throw the twelve-pound clam-shell that probably ornaments the veranda, right at the furry-head of the singer. A clam-shell has a row of sharp points on its edge, and it is extremely solid. As a rule, it penetrates far enough to convey your wishes. ”

“ It appeared afterward that Good Joe Gilbert had completely lost his head at the sight of his two divers, one obviously murdered, the other dead and mutilated, and had started off as hard as he could for the magistrate and the police on Samarai. This job was too much for him to handle, he said, and he didn't want to get his head into no murdering rows and have the Government jumping on a harmless man that only wanted to do well by every one. ”

“ We cast anchor in a wide plain of blue water, with the Gertrude not very far away. She was anchored also, and I saw by the ladder and the trailing air-tube that her diver was down. Looking closer, a second air-tube appeared.
“Why, she has two down,” I said.
“She got a new diver this morning,” remarked the captain of the Dawn. “George the Greek. He's broke, and has to work. I wish I'd got him myself: he's a rare fine diver.”
The Marquis and I looked at each other, and there was uneasiness in our faces. The Dawn rolled steadily on a long, windless swell like watered silk ”