the water, and
the rising tide was gradually creeping up over it. The gentle swish
of the sea comforted Piang. It was his friend, the only friend that
could help him escape from this island of decay. His practised eyes
discerned the shadowy forms of watchers squatting along the beach;
beyond, the patrol-boat moved about restlessly, and in the distance
twinkled the lights of Zamboanga.

"If I could only get past the lepers and the boat, I could swim back,"
thought Piang, and he looked with longing at the oily smoothness of
the water. Nothing could slip past the boat on that sea of glass in
the bright moonlight. He remembered the schools of sharks he had seen
in the _Sabah's_ wake and shuddered; but even that was better than
being doomed to die here. He pillowed his head on his arms and leaned
against the trunk; his hand closed over a piece of dry bamboo. Lifting
it to his eye, he idly squinted through it; it was smooth and clean.

Piang fell to soliloquizing. How many times, surrounded by his
friends, he had swum in the moonlight. He remembered one night in
particular. How they had sported with bamboo sticks, blowing the
spray high in the air, laughing as it fell upon each other! Piang
could swim miles with arms folded, pushing through the water like a
fish, rolling over on his back or sides, when tired. He had fooled
the tribe by staying under water for three minutes, breathing easily
through his hollow, bamboo tube. Kali had given him a prize.

Piang's eyes widened, brightened. With the bamboo stick--could he? He
blew through it softly and laughed. But how to get into the water
without being detected? The approaching tide, lapping the other end
of the fallen log, seemed to be caressing it in pity. Piang examined
it closely. Dared he crawl along the trunk? His eyes fell upon the
hole just above the water where one of his pursuers had broken through.

"Allah, I thank Thee," breathed the excited boy. He had found his
chance, had discovered a possible means of escape.

Crawling back into the log, he tested the heart of the tree and to
his joy, it crumbled under his touch. With a smothered cry, he began
to cut his way through the pithy, dust-like wood, and as he gradually
worked quantities of the soft fiber loose, he tossed it behind him. If
he could work his way through the rotted trunk before the tide turned,
it would be an easy matter to slip through the hole into the water.

It was suffocating in the damp inclosu