1938-09-09 — Page 5

CHINA MAIL

FRIDAY SUPPLEMENT. SEPTEMBER 9, 1938

HE Kanaka screwed on the

THE

helmet, leaning well over the side to do so; and Saung Lo, for perhaps the ten-thousandth "time in his life, dived gently backwards into the warm ocean.

"Not a bad little feller, for a Malay, remarked the Australian boss to his visitor from the main- land. "Only you can't get him to realise that the stuff don't fetch what it used to. Except:

for this partic'ler job, y'know, these boys ain't got much head-' piece."

Meanwhile Saung Lo was sink- ing slowly through the green translucent fathoms. His airpipe and life line trailed above him.

2

as 2

They u

ey used air escaping by the outlet-valve in a succession of explosive bubbles. A strange apparition he was, though familiar one, in these waters- the round steel helmet, the bulg- ing canvas and rubber clothing, the brown hands, naked from the wrist, holding lifeline and shell- net. And these hands were small and sweetly shaped woman's. They matched, for delicacy, the brown face screened by the steel and plate-glass.

Saung Lo, in fact, was but twenty-one years old, though he had been diving for years. Born on a Sumatra plantation, he had drifted south after the rubber boom, to find at last a job he could do that white men would always pay him for. He himself did not profess to understand

"

Short Story

the whys and wherefores of it; he only knew that he could earn money by groping in deep levels for pearl shell, apart from the propect of finding an occasional pearl. He had had such luck on several occasions, and had made extra money.

He did not know that the sum paid him was less than a hun- dredth of the price that the pearl eventually fetched in the shops of Bond-street, or Fifth Avenue. He did not know that his Aus- tralian boss traded for two hun- dred per cent profit with an American firm that made a gimi- lar profit. He did not know that thé

Jap storekeeper who sold beer and tinned provisions sy- stematically cheated him.

And since there were so many simple things that he did not know, it was not perhaps surpris- Ing that he couldn't be got to realise the world-slump, the fall in commodity prices, and the need for him to dive twice, as often and bring up twice the quantity of shell for the same reward.

Yet there wery- the other hand, a few odd things that Saung Lo did know,

He knew, for instance, the bot-

#

LIVES OF MEN

..

hardly to be described in any words of his own. He knew this secret continent steepened into depths where he could never ex- plore; often he walked to the brink and atared into the dark vastness; he felt it was his own discovery, and when afterwards he regained the surface 'the though comforted him even if the contents of his shell-net fetched a disappointing price.

He was proud that he could descend further than any other diver he had ever heard often,, twenty, even thirty fathoms, to a depth where he dare not stay more than a few moments. be- cause of a gripping numbness that came into his limbs. He did not know that this was caused by a pressure of pounds weight upon every inch of his body; his science was as deficient as his economics.

But he well knew the major symptoms of danger, and he knew also what those dangers were. He had seen men die of diver's par- alysis, yelling in hideous agonies

the throughout

warm island his nights; and he knew from own experience that if he stayed down too long, or descended too quickly. gouts of blood would trickle out of his ears and nose, and he would feel as if an iron

By James Hilton

Author of "Lost Horizon"

bar were being clamped his forehead and tightened.

across

But he did not worry. It was his job. And as the gently swell- ing current drifted him into the depths, he would have had no misgivings at all but for that mystifying business of the price- level. "What's. the matter him big feller shell not get plenty good money put longa bank, heh?", had been his protest at the time of the last reckoning with the boss. And the Australi- an's reply, given with a laugh, had been one that Saung Lo had completely failed to understand.

But as usual, his remote and private world consoled him. There were two dreams in his mind-the one quite practical, a matter of saving up enough money "longa bank" to return north someday and marry a girl of his own race; but this happy consummation was fast reced- ing in propect now that his earn- ings could scarcely keep up with Jap storekeeper's ingenuity in framing his account.

Curious-

much he tri-. ed, Jaung Lo could never quite get out of debt to the wily trader, and as long as he was in debt he would not be allowed to leave

tom of t the sea. He knew the Thursday Island. The system

geography of a small patch of ocean-floor near Thursday Island as well as most men know their own town or village, · He knew the

shelves of that world, the

worked perfectly-more perfectly than Saung

alised. But there

dream.

of the

world un

this ther mystical one illising concept

unde

the earth of other men, of secrets he alone could probe.

.

Cautiously, as he descended, he looked about him, sensing. anew the magic of his dream. He felt the air reaching him in small regular gusts the deep sea was calm, as it always was, yet with

peculiar additional calmness that came from a smooth sur face and sunny skies. One of the odd things that. Saung La

knew was to forecast the weather; he would often amuse the Australian by coming up with a prophecy of "plenty big strong feller wind." And he was almost always right.

But the Australian did not be- lieve him when he said that he learned it from the fish. But again Saung Lo was right. In- deed, on that populated sea-floor he was more learned than many professors of oceanography. He had observed over and over again, the quick, neasy move- ments of all kinds of marine creatures when bad surface weather impended. And some- times before especially severe storms, he had seen even strang- er sights there below-weird ex- istences of pulp and blubber, straying out of their proper depth as if in some fretful agitation- fantastic shadows, half-fish, half- vegetable, that broke through the long green corridors.

No use describing them to the Australian; he would not believe; he was of the other upper world. because But Saung Lo believed, he had seen, and because on more than one occasion he had been in danger through the entangle- ment of his airpipe with one of these perambulating mysteries.

Saung Lo was happy when he felt his thick rubber boots touch- ing the coral. There was a buzz- ing in his ears and a prickling behind his eyes-slight discom forts he had long grown used to. He knew exactly where he

was-on

the slope of a rocky shelf that fell away into the abyss. He looked around him, Fish of recognising the scene. many kinds passed him by, like prosphorescent gleams in the twilight; but he took no notice of them; he had, his work to do, and he could not further delay.

Signalling with his lifeline, he began to stride over the rough:

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9, 1938 |

sea-bed, while the lügger drifted with the current far above him. It was hard work, and it made him very tired" He orced his mounds of coral scram- bling on to ledges and down again into deep figures, lifting the smaller rødks to peer behind them-his mind hutomatically in- tent on a dozen dangers, but his - Øveş schtching all the time for shell, and his soul quite reason- ""ably ut enge. He did not mind this job, if only he could make enough money.

it happened, he was more than usually lucky. Soon his net was fülf of labs of pearl-shell as big as soup-plates; a good haul, and worth plenty money," if only the Australian would pay him properly. He was glad, too, because he felt increasingly tired and his head ached; if only he could have more luck like this he would not need to dive so many times a day.

He did not mind" diving för a living, but he didn't like the way his head ached when he had been down too often. Now that his net was full he pulled on the lifeline and gave the signal that he was about to ascend. He would not, he decided, go down again that day. And it was then, amid such weary satisfaction, that he felt. his whole body re-transfixed into tension by a sight that faced him a few yards away. It was the swinging shadow of the biggest shark he had ever seen.

Saung Lo, of course, had met a good many of there unpleasant creatures. He was not more than half afraid of them. He knew that they did not often attack a fully- clothed diver, being scared" by the forbidding appearance of his helmet and inflated clothes, as well as by the constant out-bub- bling of air from the escape valve. A diver, however, would act prudently in their neighbour- hood; they had an instinct for flesh, and there was always risk. of a vicious plunge at a naked hand,

Saung Lo watched the mon- ster as warily, therefore, as the monster was watching him. On this occasion he did, perhaps,

feel more than half-afraid thes

shark was so huge, and he him- self was not at his best after a day of successive dives. Still, he knew the proper technique. of these encounters, and he was far

(Continued on Page:7)

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