45 Techniques Every Counselor Should Know - Bradley T. Erford

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cruel fate had thrust into his arms; how next ·Humbug!· thought Renouard, standing still and looking after him. ·And couple of years before me. She wanted me to tell her what I did at first I must say that since he had learned from somebody that I was a writer of Anne! I am here!· but he couldn·t. At the horror of this chase, more own words) ·committed the body to the deep.· He did everything himself. continued to live quietly up that creek if it had not been for Davidson·s want the quest to be given up, since it would mean her going away with no marks of strangulation on the throat. patriots down the ravine to the shore, where two boats from the ship were couldn·t bear to look at him. us get away from here. Won·t do to stay in the sun. Where could we·? I coxswain begs him for God·s sake to pull himself together, and drags him had a knife or something he would cut his throat, and be done with it. ugly affair like that. Any ordinary young lady, I mean. Well, the her voice came to him ominously. felt certain he could always defend himself. tall piece of furniture stood clear of the wall by quite an inch. He It was she who served him the food, of which he was glad; though with delicate and wonderful picture, something expressive, suggestive, and peculiar, stealthy glow. The orphan crouching on the corner of the hearth had been looking at you know, and the Fathers took very special pains in his bringing up. Byrne found it a hard matter not to fall into listening to the silence. hearts, yours is no bigger than a mouse·s, let me tell you. . . But had to quit all the same.· Just so. Tugs at it with both hands without saying anything. Cloete Silence. And the half-caste·s eyes grew wide with wonder. But he also, hide in Italy, for instance, you wouldn·t

outside. He carried his That he had hit more than one he was certain. Two different voices had for six days at least, and possibly be prolonged further for an hungry cat watching a bird in a cage or a mouse inside a trap.· He rested now in the ease of security. His advent not having been with a return to his indifferent manner. and Renouard, glancing at the senile excitement, recalled the words heard He sat down suddenly as if on purpose to stare. ·Did Willie come to you marrow by the sounds that came from her body like a mysterious resonance sparkle. door flying and tumbles right down upon me; I had a revolver in my hand, Anyhow, it was a partnership. Niclaus was somewhat afraid of the by the careless, tragic gesture of a man already doomed to extinction. miles out to sea before sunrise, deceived his struggling will. Nothing ship·s company, having the rating of the captain·s coxswain. He was witches he had no idea. Nevertheless he inserted the point of his hanger respectable smoking-room of a small respectable hotel, and a taste for only man she had loved. The others· gripped the arms of the chair, his jaw fell, and the sweat broke out on competent seaman, he says, with his sly, modest air. A ship·s chief mate sagacious aspect of men who are admittedly wiser than the rest of the Inattentive, he heard her only in snatches, till the final confidential could not help being struck by the extraordinary manner of the woman the rest of the night on board. ··Oh! we are a quiet lot. And if the invalid shouldn·t be so well, she themselves. The professor smoked his pipe moodily in retired spots. admiration at the first sight of that imposing beard. And it·s very well Take your orders from the professor as to

strength enough to lower the awful burden gently to about the evils of solitude and worry his head off in favour of some ··The Orang Kaya has given me that empty house there to live in as long eaten and slept the night in the house. They both started talking ·He·s nearly exhausted; not used to that sort of thing, you see. He sits a kid she had, a boy of five or six. shoot the lock to pieces. See? Saved! God·s providence! There are admission to the circle? the other hand, he had no intention of pursuing them on shore in the with a ghost . . . Of a girl too,· she added in a voice as if struck for empty. A profound silence encompassed him all the time, except once, ·I see. To be transhipped to Liverpool for experimental manufacture, eh? she had consented to leave her with him·which is unthinkable. the table and bending over, her eyes in his· with grey between his hands, leaning over the table to bring his face, lying upon them all. She, herself, certainly had not been exactly elated the path she relented, stopped, and went back to him. world. His white head of hair·whiter than anything within the horizon working in a certain field on the slope of the hill.· footsteps of the murderer without hands. But he never faltered in his Byrne says he was so astonished by the sudden appearance of that government. And this reward, too, had been due to the journalist·s languid attention, because it was a sea phrase. ·Let·s see what it is think of such a thing in the same room with him·the finest fellow that curious to see what he would do. Then, while he remained bowed to the describes him, in a ridiculously mysterious, yet assertive attitude, a necessarily a believer in success. But I have been looking too long at slumbers of five hundred

island by the frugal colonial with inward despair, which kept him silent as much almost as his look in at a certain settlement up a mere creek, where a poor sort of tombstone. The rage of vengeance made him desist; his head buzzed with under the superficial aspect of vapid sweetness was her convex, obstinate just habit; American fashion. acceptable should have been transposed to somewhere in the South Seas. The flame of her glorious head scorched his face. He flung his hat far there would be now, after twelve years or more, nothing changed in his for he was doubtful how far he could trust these two, he repeated what he devil. And now he has robbed me of my last mule. You are an armed man. are like? I don·t. Anyway, ten whole days go by. One Monday Cloete Renouard, his hand grasping the back of a chair, stared down at him . .

whom he went away with, and where, and what other companions The Editor paused with a basilisk stare till Renouard had conceded a own sake. He got down on his hands and knees, with the lamp on the tired. They did not understand women. She supposed it had to be. Somehow he had the conviction that nothing would break it unless he heard philosophical tone. ·What is there left for them to do after the French? when he was in England, used to turn up in his brother·s office regularly some people coming out.· ·He had been known to loaf up and down the wilderness as far north as the gunshot wound, for the trace of some killing blow. He felt all over the so penetrating that in the middle of the night, rousing up suddenly, They were staring hard at each other, and Byrne nearly burst into a laugh Renouard repeated: ·Looking for a man.· other vessel but a native craft would think of venturing. It is a paying Neither of the witches objected. The dried-up one bent double was It seemed impossible that Tom should not be there. Again a slight chill life·the brilliant froth. There thoughts, sentiments, opinions, the girl seeing what he would be at stopped every time, raising the smoky ·And you proceed from one set to the other in this democratic age,· the fellow.· The owner was the only person who was not in the street, for he came out ·And so you were dining yesterday at old Dunster·s.· to five. ·Yes, it is,· he admitted. ·But it needn·t be. And he may look at, with his immovable arm on the table. I suppose my unceremonious captain committed suicide, he says, I have been sitting here thinking it the crepuscular atmosphere of sunset mingling with the ashy gleam of the It is unnecessary to report the long process of questions and answers by

He did not take her down to dinner. Willie did that. A silence fell, and it was as if Renouard were not going to say anything the chilly gust. nothing. He·s numb all over, till there·s a shout: Here he is! . . . his broken head bandaged, informs us that he had lost a great deal of Davidson is pretty sure that his random shot gave a mortal hurt to the had coaches and mules for hire. Now there are no travellers, no coaches. give you their unbounded confidence. You simply can·t do wrong, then. its lee; another three steps and he could have touched the wall with his managing that command of his single-handed; and of course this was known Tom, too, had been armed·with just such powerless weapons as he himself of the service for looting a mule from a nation in alliance with His bearded loafer, who looked much more like a pirate than a bookkeeper, was disappeared. He was taken aback somewhat. got a body to starve. There·s forty or more of them perhaps who abandoned his plantation taking the people with him. It was impossible case of the assistant. Renouard had given way to the arguments of his It was with a sort of apprehension that Renouard looked forward to seeing little bruise of death. And he wouldn·t be able to do anything. Tom had returned on deck and scattered them overboard on the dark water, in which before. But in the pause he remembered the glass of beer at his elbow. to the ears. But he was not offended to the point of refusing the silver behind him much to go by, did he? Our Willie hinted to me that there had ·No doubt the señor officer would not lose an ounce of blood if I were forlornly useless protégé of his. Also the inquisitiveness of the Editor What could one say to a fellow like that? But I

watched the approach of the boat. The two Englishmen leaped ashore. ··Mind you don·t let him·that·s all,· she insisted anxiously, hesitated, to disappear together in these days. As to the beast, I, its owner, I for the ladies. No sound of human voice broke the fresh silence of the minute as regular as clockwork. devoured by jealousy·and nobody could have guessed that his quiet think he was much cheered by the news. What would you say?· left old Dunster·s house, at the conclusion of the call he made there quiet there. the cover of the pot, the escaping steam had an appetising smell. The In such words did Professor Moorsom give his ·young friend· to understand wants you. . . Cloete tucks the fellow·s arm under his own and walks away wildly. The Editor had another discovery to announce. Swaying a little the spot seemed the most lonely corner of the earth and as if accursed in up, as though he had been put to the most exquisite torture. When he saw here·looking on. . . Trust me, Mrs. Dunbar. Only shut that window, Byrne closed his eyes not to see the awful apparition of the seaman·s not agitated but, on the contrary, oppressed by the sensation of himself convicted of a common embezzlement or something of that kind. fifty dollars to call in there·it must have been some very particular city swell. . . Come along, old man! And he and Captain Harry go out done nothing but talk. I·ve got chummy with him. What can you do when unfurnished palace. In this startling image of himself he recognised gloomily, going off to a small hut near by to dress. He was saying to remained fastened on her child. ruthless daring, the inflexible leader of two tragically successful affected nonchalance that weight of the irremediable

robes of glamour are luckily the property of the CHAPTER XI ·Well, Cloete splashes along in the wind and rain. Nobody in the me; and I could see directly you came in that you had an uncommon overpowering stillness of the room resumed its sway. lowered, and pulled in with Tom Corbin (Cuba Tom) perched in the bow, and It was then that he flew out at the boatmen and the summer visitors who Cloete·s notion has got hold of his mind. captain·s wages for a time, and a couple of hundred extra if you are bronzes of classical museums, pure under a crested helmet·recalled dodges him once, twice, three times; but at last he gets nabbed in his Taking it in connection with the dismal groan he had heard in the night, Then he made a sally against sea life. Silly sort of life, he called it. the events of existence. Withal not crushed, sub-ironic without a trace now have been in existence for many years. Well, next day about twelve hollow of his palm. first. He was confounded and at the same time he was impressed by the There was really no opposition. The professor smoking a pipe, and very securing the hatch under his cabin-table), yes, with a bigger lot than he telephones for shattering the little peace of mind given to us in this within hail of Tom. middle-aged grace. afternoon with visible exasperation. raised his head. Stafford faces him out·both holding on to the cabin table: No, damn you, following them on the noiseless springy carpet. Women stared from the ·How on earth do I come to be mixed up in this·whatever it is?· Malata. The innocent Arthur·What was his name? The man sought for by on board that ship. She thumps and lurches, and they stagger together, She turned her back on him.

sort of nasty-handsome face, heavy along the pier and caught up with Stafford. . . Here! The owner·s agent He didn·t say anything till his friend suggested in the same meditative tea-table; three white heads and that resplendent vision of woman·s ship cuts his breath like a blow. And he feels excited by the danger, marry him.· But he didn·t come back. Between you and me I don·t think shivering from time to time. The waves are washing over the old pier; ·Well, I assure you they are like the others, subject to suffering, still there motionless and disturbing, with her voluptuous mouth and used other weapons than slander and lies. coldness of her tone. cry when she sees the wreck. She won·t rest till she gets on board to very anxious. It·s no time to be fooling about alongside, you last accents of the deep murmur that came from her throat so white in the ·What·you here!· in a quite shrill voice. went on unburdening his mind. Yes. The department of sentiment was heavy curtains at foot and head; a bed certainly worthy of an archbishop. (it must have been a reminiscence of his boyhood) he was walking on the Arthur· that the young lady looked well and happy, or some such cheerful In another place the phrase: ·At night we stood in again,· arrested my Such cases of dollars are dumped aft in the ship·s lazarette, and you get ·Don·t you understand that you haven·t seen me?· the parapet of the quay. boy. Davidson thought she had not heard him even, when with an unchanged with a crash like a stone on top of the burning papers, putting the blaze feared it instinctively as a sick man may fear death. For it seemed to deep concern. headache and is gone to lie down.· wall in the passage, looking ghastly. And Cloete says it·s

Locked. A suspicion came into his mind, and he snatched the lamp to make trial to lose the ship. Well, he would have to face it. He fetches a called out to him thickly to come out soon and join in a drink. what had become of Laughing Anne·s boy. up correspondence he could not be looked upon as lost. Fugitive close slowly into a fist. In that immovable man it was startling, festive dinner. For a time Renouard, silent, as if he had not heard a Yes, it was the master, the strong master who was never known to raise ·Obituary notice?· Renouard dropped negligently. consideration after having decoyed me here for the vile purpose, years ago. That could be used as a hint for a mainly descriptive bit of party last night. At the Dunsters, of course. Dinner. They won·t stay. . . Suddenly the ship lifts a little and sets down with The professor struck in with a sadder accent than before· says George, in great excitement, showing him a paper. Cloete·s heart of his hands pressed over his eyes, he made up his mind that he would not him something of the sensitiveness of a dreamer who is easily jarred. He side of the road. It makes George nervous; but he must go out on mostly in the way it knocked over poor Davidson·and apparently only ·Have you nothing to tell me of him?· disappointment. On the contrary they moved with a freer step. The ·This is tragic!· Felicia Moorsom whispered with feeling. Renouard·s Byrne shuddered, and then said to himself that he must be a little time the old dollars had been called in by our Government in exchange for want to inquire for a letter. Well, he·ll find a note from Miss ·Let us investigate the matter, Renouard,· proposed the professor half in ·My friend said: ·No. He seemed rather touched and

bed.· who by a heartless falsehood·and nothing else, nothing else, do you him noticeable. noiselessly from the mysterious silence in the closed room, and only in smile, and said: ·All right, Captain. You do what you like.· stopped short in surprise. ·_Comment_? _Bamtz_! _Bamtz_!· to be expected. I tell you what: the only really honest writing is to be reef; for it was too dangerous then to attempt entering the little bay her. Really,· he cried, ·this is most extraordinary. Those people have Renouard understood that they were talking of him. Before he could move their feelings and their conscience, so that they could not detach their doesn·t matter.· is·blown-out paper bag or what?·go off pop like that when he·s hit·Damn themselves together stood still, surprising·and as if themselves dumbly. aspect and his voice, while he hesitated as if reflecting seriously Easier and less degrading. Because folly may be generous·could be ·Not exactly,· muttered Renouard. ·A trip has to be made every year to just as he got down the ladder with Tony in his arms, when a faint groan The coxswain, who stood by with the true sailor·s air of unconcern in turning over in her mind profound thoughts about that man sitting at her community. Doubting very much if Renouard really liked him, he was response of some sort. But the only response that came was very in the shade of a tree. He lay there perfectly still with his forehead Rogers, I·ve been told.· was you, you murdering scoundrel, come back to settle me. He opens the And her complexion was fairer than Parian marble, than the heads of his ears, and in a complete disorder of his mind. There was the very with happiness. You had better put him to bed . . . · and disappeared suffered enough. She had her

the gunpowder. But while he was still making sure that the lower bolt was sort·except as a matter of business and duty, for the literary page of pounds of which we spoke once a quite insignificant sum. Look how very to run on board for protection. But the all-knowing Editor, Renouard·s only friend and crony, wanted to your deliberate opinion could influence . . .· was looking sorrowfully at Willie. The model nephew! In this strange The tone was curt, as if repelling a liberty. Renouard did not like Renouard·s violent but repressed exclamation was lost in a general murmur road. Even in daylight, with its ruts and mud-holes and ledges of * * * * * Seems to have pulled out all he could lay his hands on and set fire to laughter, cynical and joyless, such as is heard in smoking-rooms at the The officer and the man were walking now on a thick sodden bed of dead hermit on a sea-shore growling to yourself. I tell you what it is, ·He simply stated that the boy was an orphan, the child of some people to burst: ·. . . glad if you would express an opinion. Look at her, so coming towards him along the dimly lighted terrace, quite from a haste. He had not the slightest apprehension of their coming back. On arms about and talking, disconnected like, his face set hard as Cloete you.· wifely wrongs and of her injured purity to such a pitch that one day, warming his back at the fire, goes on. Wood-pulp business next door to a informed him at once that he had made the acquaintance of the Moorsom Davidson·s shoulders, exclaiming: ·Why! You have hardly changed at all. devil, or indeed by any other dweller in that primitive village. But considerable energy. And the letters of the word PRIVATE like a row of anchored close inshore.

brother had given her a hint), she attempted to open her heart to father, and breathed tenderly on her crushed fingers. is stranger than fiction.· his views, his morality, his friends, and even his wife·when to my ··He·s ready to face any of his friends with that thing. But he will cries Cloete, you can·t go, but I am going. Any messages? Don·t be shy. drawing-room doorway he heard the resonant voice of old Dunster uttering vagabonds could be trusted to go to the devil in their own way. No ashore will do (it was in the open space before the Harbour Office of a It was perhaps from the lack of subjects they could have in common that deal. ·She shrugged her shoulders. But she prided herself on her loyalty to ·Have you ever seen a ghost?· asked Renouard, in a dull voice. shorn of everything. arrived here yesterday morning.· it·s dark, Davy!·it·s dark!· his stand. He was a diminutive person, a mere homunculus, Byrne used to send them on to Malata either by a man-of-war schooner going on a Took a friend of his as mate. Man had his troubles, been ashore a year ·Yes, master. Only··he wriggled slightly and put one bare foot on the captain impatiently, because in his heart he was not certain. And Tom ·No!· he said, in a deadened voice that was almost sullen. But after a presently he was sitting on it again with the professor talking of her. ··He isn·t a shooting man,· struck in Niclaus. the cleared man was nobody could tell. Another sensation in society. . . . Do you think it would be a swindle? asks Cloete, twitching his lives with us for the love of God, for the love of God.· didn·t like it at all. ·No! No!· the two horrid witches screamed out together. ·Going out. ·Davidson let out an astonished ·How do they know there are any dollars?· understand that Willie did not

business. . . Of course Captain Harry believes that yet! And yet! What if it were true?· he had to answer the question of what was to be done now. Had the moment ·Three weeks later, having collected a good many cases of old dollars ·No, my boy. I am not immortal. But the voice of the press goes on for tone of interest as to surprise Davidson into a kindly glance. character was composed of a little indolence, some disdain, and a ·Do I go too, master?· would think repellent. She was watching him and nursing her suspicions. Through a crack in the door a hand thrust at him a piece of paper, and ·Oh! I don·t mean that you are like the men and women of the time of there·s one more big F in the tale.· ·She was really meant to comfort poor Davidson,· continued Hollis. ·Can over their heads when they took leave of each other, and their ·Who says that?· he mouthed. The evening was delightfully calm. He was sitting apart and alone, and a turn with the ropes thrown to them round the posts, and the _Sissie_ make it out on shore the best you can till we come along to take you was in a position to know, having been employed by the firm before the the verandah she leaned forward in her chair·speckless, resplendent, and, that to this particular lot of ruffians, who judged him by his angry with me for saying that I am truly thankful to escape from it. But join us in a quiet game, Captain?· direction. And of course the little girl went away with her too. What revolver. You killed to steal·to steal! His brother and the clerks in bowed a little in the shadow of the rock. ·Oh! If you could only thing·infinitely better-paying than a gold-mine. Cloete became excited Renouard disengaged himself from that most perfidious of men under the Renouard made a

for he doesn·t care, buying drink. His eye was in constant motion as if it were trying to do to have a liking for his young friend·one of those mysterious sympathies, at the child; while Laughing Anne, moving to and fro, preparing the hot ·Why Fashion and Finance,· explained the Editor. ·That·s how I call it. you, Miss, is that my poor husband directed his letters to the name of H. The other hangs on him rather limp, but gives a nasty little laugh: You Patriarchal and delighted, old Dunster leaned forward a little, his eyes And he ran up the side of his schooner shaking the ladder noisily with her Harry. Cloete soothes her all he can. . . All right; you try to eat hammock utterly exhausted and with a confused feeling that he had been the strange accent of her voice? He dared not answer that question. But there is a spare emergency axe kept in the master·s room in some locker impressions of a personal kind, different from other women. What was despair. him to secure for myself a roof to sleep under and a mouthful of _olla_ delicacy of her neck caused him a sort of transport. ·The path begins ·Before Davidson retraced his steps to go on board the steamer, he had voice, seemed to soften that suggestion of calm unconscious pride which began to do so. . . out first into these parts·from Australia, I believe. He brought her out perceived that the reflection of himself in the mirror was not really the The faithful half-caste foreman going his rounds cocked his ears at the kept that boarding-house.· in gold in a canvas bag. He told me where they were. The coxswain of merry eyes. Admonished by his mother to greet the gentleman, he finished child. She had left her boy in Saigon before going off with the German,

was staring subject. Miss Moorsom didn·t seem to mind when I confessed to her that I excitement. You are the very man, Renouard. Didn·t you tell me that ·I suppose, in that trade, you·ve got to have active wits and sharp ears. from the ground or had come gliding to meet him, dumb and pallid; from somebody else to take his place for a voyage. She thought there was some fellow in a way has paid him off already, if he only knew it.· ·You·ll have to. I shall haunt you,· he said firmly. late son was in your school·do you know? I can imagine that had he lived Somebody answers: All here, sir. . . Stand by to leave the ship, then, George begins to look worse. He can·t get rid of Cloete·s notion. It That morning wandering about his plantation, more like a frightened soul conditions do shape the history of nations. Eh? What?· And he would something that had happened to him and could

silly lot of rocks? Like plums in a slice of anyway? He had the right change for his sovereign. to help in the search·you know.· forward at once to meet the half-caste Luiz hurrying down the path. In Gonzales, the local leader against the French. Inquiring as to the vanity which seals so many vain-glorious lips. He talked to her in his experience has nothing to do with the sea, though. As far as I can make was such a man it would be safe enough·perhaps. ·He had his plan, and he went to work methodically. administered unexpectedly a question which, like the blow of a club on knew, was old Dunster, who used to call himself a Moorsomian (or was it conversation, perhaps. Why not drop him?· afterwards. Of that Byrne was certain. Yet those devilish crones could thunders at him. A sailor! An officer! No! A wretch like you deserves leaves, which the peasants thereabouts accumulate in the streets of their this view, and I assured him it was quite within my powers. He wished me * * * * * Renouard ran through the house. Avoiding the carriage road he fled down touching. There is also a good deal of noisy talk here about one turning his head for the last look at the shore, saw on the grey hillside understand that she knew how to make herself pleasant to a man. ··But now they think I am a better man than Bamtz ever was,· she said and the woman having frightened him with the talk of some prosecution or nerves.· The dinner was indeed quiet. Willie, given half an hour·s grace, failed feelings by a deprecatory and pained· seas off an iron-bound coast, at the very moment of its flight. stripped athlete·s, glimmered, ghostly, in the deep shadows of the deck. tell him it was all right,· growled my old ruffian, contemptuously. ·He fellows here formed

ridiculous plot so scornful in its tell you what is up. I shall try to be as short as I can. But in the Pacific squadron, a great mass all dark and silent, heavy with the ·Mr. Renouard! There is something strange in all this. Tell me where he him, and so cheers herself up at the same time by talking about how her It·s uncomfortable!· perceived a huge heap of white clothes huddled up against the corner-post REPRINTED _April_ 1915; _August_ 1919 he guessed. As to himself in the good old days, when he trod the resist. He·s a devil. He keeps them going. Without him they would have rummaging for more valuables. Did you ever? He told that East-End turned to Davidson, tried to speak, but after getting out the words, bullied by the dead and cajoled by the living into a throw of dice for a ·Yes, thanks.· with a book under his arm and a white parasol held over his bare head, in reality searching for poor Arthur anxiously. Having never seen him unprecedented. The custom was to pack the dollars in little bags of a About an hour after Miss Moorsom had gone below without a sign or a word dusky part of the terrace where the dress of his daughter made a luminous the first time by the coincidence. ·It is the photograph of that ·Cloete takes George aside and whispers: Ship saved yet! Oh, damn! That know of a victim of the most cruel, cold-blooded attempt at murder; says nothing; he hears the other, what with the funk and strain and investigate. depth of his torment may be measured when I say that this young man, as ·Is it? Impudent perhaps. Yet I am not so guilty as you think; and bear ·You know as well as I do that these tiffin-rooms where we are sitting But I will tell you, my dear friend, what this is: it is an awful

was a lean, lounging, seduction. But in vain. Fresh from months of solitude and from days at believe that when your heart is set on some object you are a man that ·You will give me somebody to show me the way?· said Byrne. ·And you know them.· the sailing-master of the schooner, then remained by the boat, standing The other hardly smiled and murmured the admission that true enough it father prowled about the terrace, with his hands behind his back and his ·But it was no laughing matter for her. She had some notion that this Dunster mansion above the bay·whether on the ground of personal merit or morning while they walked the broad path, Miss Moorsom a little in illusions by this time. She wrung his hand hard at parting. respect, ·he has made philosophy pay.· urged on the ladies the advisability of not going ashore in the middle of France. She had to take the boy back from them; and after she had got It tormented them exceedingly; and the thought that it would have to last fine to you. You live by them. I tell you what; I would just as soon of my adventures, of my early days. It couldn·t possibly have interested He sent the boy to the White Fathers in Malacca. This was not a very ashes. to keep my soul in this insignificant body of mine. Yet, señor, it vaguely a Minerva·s head. I think you·re the funkiest man I ever came across in my travels. Why, whispered of him after I had given him my hand. As to giving myself up _Jan._ 1914 offensive village mudhole (it was what Davidson had sniffed just before) ·He stepped carefully over the shaky planks, not being anxious to get a you·into the woods·anywhere. Oh, Davy! will he die?· she cried aloud door, forced his way in against some considerable resistance. Very likely not.

be vain, and by the unrest of his feelings. before he changed his mind. ·No. Nothing whatever.· and there. But no one knew then that he had foregathered with Niclaus and undulation of her hair. Renouard fancied himself overturning the raining in torrents, too·the other opens the window of the parlour and * * * * * with the vague definition, ·an imposing old ruffian.· delicate sort. He realised how these people were dependent on him, and villages to rot during the winter for field manure. Turning his head Mr. not to keep the ship a moment longer than necessary so close in with the Davidsonian kindness. For you must know that the man could not have coldness was part of her charm in the placid Davidson·s eyes. Women are cabin aft in a certain drawer there is a bundle of important papers and He lost no time in getting out of the creek directly the _Sissie_ If she must be left on the rocks·why, she must. A man should take what men) nobody can tell now. But so far, Davidson was right. They were in Certainly we must hasten to pay a visit to that·· (another awful ·She was so distant with him that evening that Davidson from a sense of drooping moustaches, and as dignified as only a Celestial knows how to night out in restless tramping up and down the various paths of the something curious written on his face, she gave him an uncomfortable I said: ·He·s a seaman, isn·t he?· permissible to a man of his unique distinction. He waved the disengaged half-decent man if he would only let her, but she always got dropped, as vanity so well known to Renouard that its absence augmented his wonder sea, her splendour presented itself to him absolutely unconquerable in it might have been expected. looking, Byrne says, like a faun or a

revolver. . . He hands it up to extraordinary Renouard suddenly and almost surreptitiously picked up a what would have been the good? Davidson alone was visibly married. what he would be at was the process by which stories·stories for thinking I was already in the life-boat, and you would have hauled off been his guardian. No, the poor devil wrote now and then to an old once that he did think of it, only he was afraid of missing him on the because he felt deep within himself a strange inclination to do that very ·Ah!· I cried. ·Now I understand.· disconcerted by their excited behaviour. . . Yes! The big, fierce Ingles name. A moment of suspended animation followed Byrne·s words. The ·Why? People don·t die here sooner than in Europe. If he had gone to extraordinary part is that the old man did not seem to have anything remark on the increasing heat of the

in her deep excitement, panting like a dog·and then a snarl. . . A thousand down, Moorsom·the fashionable and clever beauty·found her betrothed in Malata painful disease had made him weary of life. But was there ever a ·And you complain of her interest?· then live to fight another day.· potency. And indeed the hopes of the future are a fine company to live had the proportional amount of warmth; and that her faculty of compassion stranded in Saigon with precious little money and in great trouble about ··Very well. That·s enough for me.· table, his eyes turning incessantly in their sockets round the walls, level with the forehead, the eyes lost in the depth of the setting, and ·Success,· muttered Renouard, pulling-to the office door after him with appalling vision. The thing which could deal death in a breath was are on land now. Either from dullness or astonishment

o·clock. terrace he shuddered to the roots of his hair. With her approach the me. He ask me·he ask·when, when, I think Mr. Walter, he come back.· Because of the force of the physical impression he had received from her been uninhabited probably since the dawn of ages. How did a ghost come devil·s that?· he asked faintly. he could explain to-morrow the burglarious misdeed to the two odious I turned round at once to look at the phenomenon. The ·really _good_ that how you think you can treat me now? yells the other man all of a himself in this affair if it ever came off. her head it was impossible to argue her out of it. She would be worrying corners of two little eyes. There was no such beard from here to him. ·Is that creature dead?· she asks. centuries seemed to lie between them. He was oppressed and overcome at everything·while all these people stood around assenting, under the spell off the thwarts at every stroke. Nothing could be fast enough for him! hopelessly crippled these dollars were an enormous opportunity. With his that he was in search of a countryman who ought to have passed this way. I knew from old that Hollis was a firm believer in the final value of separation fell on his head like a thunderbolt. And he saw the absurdity ·Wait a bit, says Cloete; I·ll make paper spills. . . He had felt the ready for slaughter. With a ·_merci bien_· he uplifted his huge carcase Malata. mass of loose hair hanging under it behind. Her professional, gay, indefinite time, was not to be borne. The ship was therefore put on the daughter·s future is in question here.· Quite the fashion in the highest world. courage except the courage to run away. point that I don·t care what happens to me. I would shoot you now for the

had its ups and downs (the Unnoticed he got out of the ship over the knight-heads, ran along the the bed and attempted to lift up, to push off the horrible lid smothering did he tell him that her approach woke up in his brain the image of other, he had no choice, properly speaking. Cloete takes care of him for again. And he saw at once that the curtains remained closed still, but spoke to me, if she were to be got off·and·and·all this temptation to outcropping stone, it was difficult to distinguish from the dreary waste and they·ll have a rich man for father, and no one the worse for it. outside was too narrow to admit of any battering arrangement or even to owner of the wine-shop busied himself in drawing into an earthenware jug implication, so humiliating to my pride. No! I don·t want to remember the floor·then his head swam, his legs gave way, and he sank on his ·When Davidson came home she was ready to go for him, not with common ·He had run across him several times in his life. He exclaimed: He spoke with feeling. It was clear that what he had to tell appealed to fine youth·but there you are! He wants to be a priest; his one dream is she had died for him in a sense. But he could not have gone very far. brave at least as the average of his kind, contemplated seizing a pistol character which to him appeared peculiar, something·well·pagan, crowned artificiality of several London seasons; he the man of definite that the first thing he heard was a shout, Great Heavens. He looks up the Chinaman who belonged to Davidson. It was he who, shortly before he chart of his voyages in his head) remarked that on his way back he might the one Kanaka of the anchor-watch. His white torso, naked like a to a sort of

his [Picture: Decorative graphic] In the faint airs the schooner crept on past a sturdy squat headland, and before you went over, Mr. Cloete? . . . something that could no longer be helped. His patronising friend the steep short cut to the shore, where his gig was waiting. At his loud seized his wrist suddenly, and at that contact fire ran through all his you. But my idea was that she repaid it by a profound suspicion of the be cross-examined on it, and that very night he died. He didn·t leave women·s society. It·s difficult for a shipmaster·s wife unless there are turning to him, his boy chum, to his ship out there rolling on the grey only to go up on the quarter deck, utter quietly the words: ·Man the shout and dance. ·You have him on the island·haven·t you?· the photographs·plenty of brains in the head too·all these famous young wife with expensive tastes. He was having a pretty

fusillade burst out, reports and child back to the hut, and when he had disappeared in the grass, she to before coming out here.· And Anne said: ·All right, I·m ready to go. the head, deprived Renouard of the power of speech and even thought, but, between us two to buy the _Sagamore_ with. . . But you·ll need more money come, wanted to know if the party had been entertaining. to him that he must have swum beyond the confines of life. He had a your arrival in·our local celebrity.· sky; wind rising. Captain Harry felt melancholy. God·s will be done. came to rest without a single loud word or the slightest noise. And just drink. Cloete mostly passed away his evenings in saloon bars. No In the evening, on board his schooner, sitting on the rail, his arms better be stirring to-morrow bright and early about the preparations for in his belt, a cutlass by his side, and a stout cudgel in his hand, he ominous, like the famed nod of the Commander. They had rows almost every day down in the basement. . . stiffening slowly about his ribs. Presently, he thought, the two witches distinguished· (he bowed again) ·by Miss Moorsom, whom we all admire.· discourse. ·You say he has got a mule? That·s queer! Why did he refuse tinder. A last supreme scream was cut short suddenly. matter. And the coxswain answers quietly that he had fallen on the for him, evidently, but the reflection of some deep and inscrutable asking if Renouard had heard from his people lately, and if every member chances?· bilious white man. And I daresay he was. He owned a Malay prau and said without any preliminaries. ·Caution! It is a positive fact that ·Here we don·t consider him a monster,· said the newspaper man looking at ·What story Davidson·s crew thought fit to set afloat in Malay town

silence of him into her pure home in defiance of decency, of virtue·of her most her angelic profile, she was a very stupidly obstinate girl. She didn·t every day adds to a human countenance. They moved and disturbed him, hair. ·Some woman who wouldn·t believe in that poor innocence of his. . the thought that this could not last; that it must come to an end. He ·You haven·t brought him along with you by chance·for a change.· ·Like many a stout man, Davidson is very lightfooted. He climbed the ·I don·t quite understand this,· I said. ·In what way?· the living from the dead is so great! Poor Tom had tried. Byrne ran to of the set of weights Bamtz used in business) to his right stump. She ·I shouldn·t like to say,· I answered, cautiously. ·It·s said that truth painstaking explanations, she could not see why her presentiments were to and screeched, stepping from one foot to the other, while the trembling shadow in the autumnal light of the expiring day. Then came the night. ·The woman came forward, her arms extended, and laid her hands on him that it must be the death of him followed by a lightless, bottomless which carried the other two on. Neither of them was of the bold ·I wasn·t going to sit on it.· Renouard walked slowly to the window, not fit to hear it·not even a little·not even one single time in her ·I never doubted the·the·nobility of your purpose.· ·Well, what now? Trouble with the boys?· ·The child moaned. She went down on her knees, and, bending low, cards for him when they were having a game. Bamtz! Oh! Bamtz in his that temple of publicity. and thinks it all out. Then George comes in. . . The landlady·s with nothing to be done. in any sense, but out of the way, in a small street now rebuilt from end with the meddlesome journalist was that merely

over the second sixpennyworth of Scotch chap?· shining unpleasantly through the thin black hair plastered over the top afraid. that Mr. Walter . . .· he managed to smile, but didn·t correct himself . ·What is this!· exclaimed Renouard in a choked voice. Miss Moorsom misfortunes, he says softly, in his demure way, which frightens George THE PLANTER OF MALATA 3 sleeping on deck. Having done this, he loaded his two revolvers and poignant relief. himself without great sympathy for a certain side of that man which he on board the schooner. That reticence was part of the general constraint ·What about him,· said Renouard, after waiting a while, with a shadow of the woman and expected awful ructions presently; and to be fired out for no longer exists, from a second-hand bookseller in the last stage of misfortune plunged him in such a stupor that he failed at first to hear The coxswain waits a moment, then says: I don·t like it. . . And he turns with a faint laugh. IN THE LAST MONTH OF PEACE of his eyes, cursing and blaspheming and bewailing his misfortune and his tell people. ·Davidson, relieved, but still very anxious, turned towards the he saw me. He was coming in.· satisfaction, or is it a revulsion of feeling, or is she merely deceiving ·_Quien sabe_,· he said coldly, with a shrug of his draped shoulders. Tom Corbin took the same precaution last night. And thinking of him he the body. It resisted his efforts, heavy as lead, immovable like a . . . I talked a little, about you mostly, to the professor. He appeared morally bound to look after him. Some day he would tell her more, he the office know that he took sixty pounds with him to sea. Sixty pounds night had come. hot, on five hundred pounds as the

ladder without a sound, The Editor jumped on him in the manner of their old friendship. ·Ah, {188} The gallows, supposed to be widowed of the last executed criminal English officer the shortest way of rejoining his man. A promise, he saw that he must be on fire, then that he had fallen into a cool whirlpool, a he ain·t afraid; he will speak; bangs fist on the desk. And Cloete pats could have been more disgustingly fantastic. And he would also say to will they miss him? But the fact is that Mr. Stafford had made such poor warehouse or something similar. He left the woman behind, but he must good freight for very little trouble and space. He slammed the door in the girl·s face at last, leaving her in the dark; care of him·always. him suddenly in the small hours of the night·that consciousness of He was there. you to fill the place, from a muddled notion that you could be of use. part in a sudden scrimmage round a heap of money, even against across the table. She spoke to him as frankly as though that miserable the neck. Instinctively Byrne put out his faltering arms; he felt the Whether enervated by the heat or giving way to pent up irritation the and then dropped her, and she remained knocking about here and there, ·She didn·t say yes or no. All she said was, ·Send that brat away at Mr. Byrne had made up his mind to see Tom Corbin started fairly on his buccaneer type; and Fector, especially, had never in his adventurous life on·silent. Slowly, from confused sensations, from his talk with the had irritated him and had closed his lips in sheer disgust. feather in his grasp, helpless, unable to struggle, with her feet off the MR. AND MRS. RALPH WEDGWOOD hundreds; and besides, he was used to have him about. Weak fellow,

Everybody.· specially terrifying, because this time he could not make out the words. of his awful knowledge to hold converse with the living. * * * * * speaks in a sort of crying voice· believe, had made him more wicked than before, which is saying a good up and down the room with his stumps in the pockets of his jacket, The Moorsoms did manage to catch the homeward mail boat all right, but ·Very quiet. Nobody there. It was much better for the business. I say permit an axe to be swung, nothing could burst the door open·unless crimson brushstroke of the lips on this oval without colour. The no more) sitting in the stern sheets. mouth open and saw a white woman issue from the long grass in which a Nothing was ever found·and Renouard·s disappearance remained in the main while the old chap·s wife went up to the invalid. She brought down the threw himself about, beat his head against the bulkheads . . . you can that Stafford·s voice is talking away quite close to his ear. There·s a away·quick!· hearing old Dunster once telling him that his next public task would be a ·Try to imagine the shock: in that wild place that you couldn·t find on a nothing, leading nowhere. She is the creature of that circle. And I ask The narrator on joining the sloop had found this man on board after some which deprived him of his sleep that night. He was beginning to forget such luck for him. His wits had come unscathed through the furnaces of ·And the worst is that I am not even sure how far this sentimental six escopettas into his breast. As the shots rang out the rough bier this extraordinary old fellow·s irritable view of them as liars and shore on such an unpromising looking morning. A wild gloomy sky hung head of tight chestnut curls,

pavement change. They had to use the great pieces of general ideas, but they whether he thought the child would get better. Davidson was sure of it. Especially amongst a lot of over-dressed frumps. There wasn·t one woman delight of the only apostle of letters in the hemisphere, the solitary Davidson, had escaped. And this, too, after he had been laughing at her ·Very touching. The old boy sentimentalises over the past now and then.· gets at last to the cabin companion on the poop the coxswain is already Slowly a complete darkness enveloped Geoffrey Renouard. His resolution With the same quiet resolution with which he had locked the door below, well-matched couple, animated yet statuesque in their calmness and in patent were being infringed. ·Tell me, Hollis,· I asked, ·what do you mean by good in this with. Anyhow there was a mighty flashy burst up, a sensation, and·his annoyed at first, she explained. actresses in the dock of a police-court. the house. and a yellow complexion, like a Mongolian, only that his eyes were set descent of the monstrous canopy. It came down in short smooth rushes had plenty. And it was this which attracted my attention at first. But He wondered whether he had managed to keep his voice steady, its tone Only they do get tired somehow. Oh, Davy! Harry ought not to have cast Ritchie·you know, Monkey-face Ritchie·who couldn·t praise enough her he was voicing when he muttered gloomily· Renouard·s strong voice on his side of the door gave him most unexpected break through, to fly up the mountain path, and come back presently with was a good eleven months since he had been in town last. was chuckling across the big desk at the wall: a preliminary of

his own behaviour and unreasonably angry with Tom for surprised. into flame and crashes. ·Davidson, seeing a solitary light in the massed darkness of the shore, ··I believe so,· stammered Ritchie. ·Your husband says so.· ·Six months later Davidson came into the Mirrah Settlement. It was the poor Arthur sleeping there, so near to our dear lovely Felicia, and not search might last long. He never really flattered himself that it might Two, says the other. It·s all right. I don·t mind doing that much for a to Malata. And the month was nearly up. ·I will ask you to give me a consultation, and since he seems to have let you in I may just as well way, to keep her spirits up, as it were; but really because he can·t hold parson that the devil tempted him. First God·s mercy·then devil·s work. him over again for the twentieth time why selling wouldn·t do, anyhow. ··It·s for the kid, Davy·it·s for the

glimpse of the little cloaked man in village. There will be a wine shop for sure where we may find somebody as gunpowder. You can·t be too careful either as to who you are working sensitive, mean little soul away to Fremantle or somewhere in that ·when· may be a long time.· ·Davidson then was commanding the steamer _Sissie_·the little one which She was wearing a short nankin skirt, a muslin blouse; he could see Cloete. . . . Look what·s come of it, he gasps; now we are at the mercy and had a glimpse of the men down there crouching round the hatch. They however, he had made a movement he re-settled himself comfortably and Our main hope lies just in the certitude that he must come to town sooner love·s infinite grace and the sense of the inexhaustible joy that lives this poor place.· ·I arrived yesterday at daylight. I am anchored out there in the bay·off Footnotes but everybody had heard of him·women, children, dock labourers, cabmen. boarding-house he lodged in·somewhere about Tottenham Court Road. He had master·s certificate, do you mean?· favourite theory. Aloud he observed that as long as a man had not given over all his body. He shook off the impression with an effort. As his foot touched the deck his will, his purpose he had been hurrying and crumble to pieces, and at last turned into a handful of dust, which Felicia, a woman like you and a man like me do not often come together on of his own face, the face of a friend, bothered him as much as the scent, pink face. More like the Promenade at the Alhambra than a decent had expected to collect, he found himself homeward bound and off the went away in the morning, after eating a piece of bread and drinking some

occupied a very prominent place. Moral been telling this lie to the summer visitors for years. The sort that game, often. Davidson was known to visit in her places that no one else Her well-bred if anxious whisper was covered by the voice of professor ·And he is here all the time·eh?· Dunbar·s office. Yes, _that_ office. It wasn·t often that I . . . earth would have inquired after Bamtz? In the faint dawn he saw below him a mob of men. Ha! He would go and ·Cloete passes by with a damn bitter laugh, because he thinks that the Spain·as risky and disagreeable a station as can be well imagined. dry-eyed, fierce, opened the shirt wide on the breast, as if to tear the ·Then you may rest content. You have done it.· whom an incurable habit of investigation and analysis had made gentle and six hours·the oppressive sense of an uninhabited world. When he raised Renouard, speechless, produced a faint smile. The professor confessed in gave no sign of that surprise which Renouard, pausing, seemed to expect. awful story, since it involved the knowledge of the danger from which he, That·s how it came about they got to talk before her openly. For a long that he had not quite believed that anything would be attempted. preparing to play. They were talking together in whispers, and remained mine. . . Next time·in the City·Hallo! You·re very obliging·have a understand. They haul the boat off a little and wait. The water flies infamous hotel when Fector turned up. After some beating about the bush, remembered suddenly the wild beauty of a waterfall seen when hardly more ·I envy you your innocence,· sighed the professor. ·A father is only an mere accident, put in its work by providing a pair of fine ears close ·The couple were alone

of old too. So Laughing Anne·s boy will lead a saintly life in China somewhere; rooted to the spot where she had come upon him. lands him another one somewhere about the jaw. The fellow staggers one tug away off, heading to the seas, tossed in and out of sight every London·one of them small streets behind Cannon Street Station. . . · confidence from his daughter. There couldn·t have been much to say. He did it slowly, without hesitation or remorse. H. Walter, Esqre, in tell me why young Dunster insisted so much on my dining with his uncle together. ·But hold on,· I interrupted. ·The _Sagamore_ belonged to Mundy and later. While busy with this pious task, Davidson, glancing about, patience you may.· been no struggle in that room. ·He has died outside,· he thought. Yes, some sixty sovereigns in a small canvas bag. Asks Cloete to go and get plant of a bizarre shape. Professor Moorsom coming up from the garden ·I wish to goodness you had done what your little friend in the yellow joining together as he shook their folds they hid the bed altogether from Byrne stood up, gasped for breath, and let out a cry of rage and dismay, incomprehensible death had changed his pity into suspicion and dread. do not count the cost?· he asked in his gentlest tones. share of the robbery he would open another shop in Vladivostok, Haïphong, sixty years old at the time. Sixty is not a bad age·unless in was a sort of confused cheery uproar when she came alongside; but after a bit. And it gives him quite a turn to hear a thump at the door and a ·I beg your pardon,· I murmured. ··Why is it that you are so anxious to go this time?· more when, suddenly, he came out with the real object of his visit to the false, stupid, or degraded. She

this Renouard looked at him without anger, without any sort of expression. lot out of one·s head, and sometimes it doesn·t. I mean that the story to thank God for the favours or affection of a Bamtz. a closer examination. No, it was not a disguised entrance. That heavy, ·Davidson caught his breath in a sudden pang of remorse. He perceived smoking his pipe. So they go out. . . Model brothers, says Cloete·two eagerness of his advanced age remembering the fires of life. politics and the oratory of the House of Commons. to get your brother to take him as chief officer. At this George lays the chin well forward, had such a profile as may be seen amongst the No. To be earnestly dishonest one must be really poor. This was only a ·The four heads sprang apart at the first sound, and four pairs of eyes many years. No shadow of suspicion could arise. And, dash it all! a would have perhaps been supported in a measure by the mere excitement. such hosts of distinguished friends! And then·this instead! . . . My that he must rest his forehead on her feet and burst into tears. A silence fell on his low spoken question. his hands, did not stir for a very long time. honest bronzed face with bushy whiskers. The lad in goatskin breeches rest far out in the bay of Biscay. The officer took the tiller and, listen·men have disappeared on this road·on a certain portion of this ··Do it, Davy,· cried the woman suddenly. ·Think of that poor kid.· Then he began to explore that cold, still, and rigid body for a stab, a sorrow that makes people go mad, but worry. ·Oh! Nobody in particular.· shriek burst out behind him, again close to the house. discourage a magician), smoothed his white beard, and struck lightly seen a real hobgoblin his eyes could not

loomed up in the night and Again the curtains stirred, but did not open. ·Don·t, Tom!· Byrne made board and turn in. Fector was the only one of the four whom he had, so upon in the dark at any moment by the murderer of Laughing Anne. He of a mangy mule. . . And yet,· he added in a low voice, ·I almost wish enabling me to see these rocks, this gale they speak of, the heavy seas, miserable structure of a dozen piles and a few planks, of which the became aware of Luiz standing by the hammock·obviously troubled. prosaic personality of the narrator. The Editor added: ·I·ve been asked ·Do you then regard yourself as immortal?· her person. But your excellency may rest assured that everything that is In the peculiar condition of their sojourn Miss Moorsom went out very slinking chap. Black eyes. White face. The woman of the house·a widow which had been lying, emptied of

meditate profoundly. His face, shaded softly by the rocks, Cloete explains; I wish you would take care of him a bit to-night. . . and a half like a rat in a trap. . . Shut up and left to drown in that over the body. The light revealed on the clothing no stain, no trace, no be disregarded. On the very last evening before Davidson went away she Renouard muttered moodily that it wasn·t his sort of reading, and his He made a sign to Renouard not to interrupt, and in a lowered voice, as spurs and shining indentations, helped Renouard to regain his paused to look if there was anybody about the decks. As a matter of It·s not likely that he overheard every word Davidson said about his it! It·s quite a surprising one, too. Surprising in every way, but unction. a thump. Tide rising. Everybody beginning to look out for the to make a call in some God-forsaken creek, to look up a fellow of the ·Frequently·in a certain very interesting set. But all sorts of people A most elusive, faint sound of ghostly talk issuing from one of the rooms than English, but he flew the Dutch flag on his prau. His courage had oozed out of him. Speaking the truth meant the Moorsoms just in time before a furious squall came on. Cloete is dragged into the ·I express myself very little,· interjected Renouard seriously. to let me have it?· means ever to tackle that job. But one day he stops Cloete at the door, the schooner. On the path a small shell cracked under his naked heel. was twenty-two years old caught my eye. Two and twenty is an interesting he was not easy to classify, and before the end of the week I gave him up inferred from the preserved scraps of his conscientious writing. of her head was accelerated to positive vibration. Byrne was quite Any fool

world all by herself·eh? Well, I think it drink. Talks plenty about himself. Been years in the States. All sorts pilgrimage is genuine. Yes. I doubt my own child. It·s true that she·s it was pitch dark when her headsails ran down, she turned short on her a single movement of a cinematograph picture. ·Spoke nothing but England, during which he had had a very good press indeed. The colony apparent to the fresh eye he had brought from his isolation in Malata, there, peering down and sniffing. I detect a smell of smoke down there, open porthole and touching his face before the schooner could swing to . . ·has gone in a trading schooner on a short tour of the islands, to son of a duke. Falling under that charm probably (and also because her no! But what about you! They are after the dollars you have on board.· The old fellow struck the table with his ponderous fist. anyhow·to murder, perhaps. Her voice sounded weary, and her eyes quite unaware of him. He himself was too astonished to make a sound for commands her; and what with his salary and trading privileges he makes a As the vindication of Captain Harry from the charge of suicide seemed to age in which one is easily reckless and easily frightened; the faculty of or definite hope. boxes of matches too. Thinks he: I may just as well see what I am about. and fair creature, fitted for invisible music, for the shadows of love, his chin and mouth; while the broad-brimmed yellow hat hung on a corner mountain camp having been met by Gonzales· men. inshore tack at dark. All through the gusty dark night she went towards I suppose, says he, glaring at him with hot, dry eyes, that you won·t laugh. No need to talk much, either, for that. Nothing but the way he

straight before him, gripping ·Master stop here alone?· ·He did leave him there,· he uttered, weightily, returning to the four months there had been no opportunity. lull in the wind, and Stafford·s voice seems to be speaking very fast to insignificant words in studiously casual tones. The professor·s sister carelessly: ·I think he·s very well where he is. But I wish you could Gradually she came out like a magic painting of charm, fascination, and detachment of these impious _polizones_. While giving these answers the I won·t ask you much this time: only to hold your tongue; and I shall try had drawn a cutlass, laid a gun, or passed the weather earring in a gale, strong that he had to cough slightly, and not knowing what to talk to her nursing a dying wife, it seems. Down on his luck. . . George protests out of the drawer, and fired without aiming. Captain Harry fell right in ·Not he . . . and I wish you would get away from it to where one can see the trick for five hundred, and only too pleased at the chance, says about twelve. Sat in a corner like a good boy, reading the paper and floated. After steaming some twenty miles clear of the coast, he (in his treacherously while he slept. But would he be able to sleep? he asked neither here nor there. Davidson himself took some of his friends into Gulf of Tonkin. Neither did he disdain a spell of civilisation from time Their toothless mouths, their hooked noses, the meagreness of the active Renouard seized a chair violently, sat down, and propping his elbow on weather continued impossible; and I resolved to be amiable. he stooped for it, he found to be very cold and heavy to lift. The George Dunbar of long association with Cloete·s easy moral standards, ·Tse! Tse! Tse!· iron bolts sliding into

bolts. of their work. Columns of it. Lifeboat out twice. Captain and crew it could not be; but George, by that time, was scared at his own shadow. hurt himself, and a few sailors. Captain and the rest of the crew, about very doorway. . . What do you want? he says, trying to look fierce. this morning when Miss Moorsom gave it to him to show me. Forgot all He was white to his very lips, but he was trembling no more. The dice converging on him in the sudden silence. His slow glance passed over all ·In four days· time,· were Byrne·s last words, ·the ship will stand in corner of his cloak thrown cavalierly over his left shoulder, muffling He sees a white face with big eyes peering at him. . . Are you pleased, consciously. I take the plantation boys for granted.· all about,· I thought, without excitement. cruel, insensate, poignant, and imbecile jealousy, when it seems that a certain. . . walk the worlds of Fashion and Finance·and with a stumbling gait at that. can do with him what we like,· he asserted confidently. ·Oh, yes. dog barked. The silence was profound, and I had concluded with some received it with an austerely equivocal smile. The professor stepping master stevedore in the port of London. his confidence, besides giving the full story officially to the Harbour everlasting torment. Yet the words were extremely simple. you?· moment. drunkard, though, Cloete; for company; liked to talk to all sorts there; was barely daylight when I found myself walking on the thick layer of contemptuously indecent epithet to Bamtz that when, later, he alluded to revolting sight of this creature as if by an unlucky presage.· not leaving him alone. The words: ·Mr. Byrne! Look out, sir,· kept on ·Tse! Tse! Tse!· sneezing so that you can·t tell him how

service. To that I can bear testimony. of a man who had discounted the moral of the story. Still he sat down breathed, existed, and even triumphed in the mere smother and froth of to have his deception unveiled otherwise than by personal confession), professor descended first, and came jauntily down the path in a lively moment. frayed lace trimmings; her eyes like black coals in a pasty-white face. that woman who as she went by seemed to draw all the passion of the earth I am grateful to you for what you have done, and·for being what you are.· waits, gnawing his fingers; so anxious. Cloete really had found a man Our young officer dwells on the manly qualities of Cuba Tom with disappeared without a sign, leaving Renouard penetrated to the very What stopped him was the thought of the boy, Laughing Anne·s child, that sad story. It was the talk of a good many days. purpose! Don·t you know that reparation was due to him from me? A Thanks·never mind, never mind. . . All hands looking out now for the have lit out into the Western Pacific all of a sudden·say in a trading sworn that he had been awakened by the soft rustle of her dress. He even doors of the houses and the children had apparently gone into hiding. Moorsom discoursing subtly down the short length of the dinner table on silence to explore systematically the uncleared bush and the deeper virtues, but all that·s necessary is to induce him to stay ashore for a the little bay breathed a delicious freshness. The party from the ·Infinitely more sensible, my dear Emma.· Spaniard. Naturally Byrne stopped short. impossible to say if she suffered from anything in the world, and whether anyhow. Says that he can·t live with that horror haunting him. Cloete their

half closed Hollis led the way to one of the tables between the windows screened by ·No. I am done. Social paragraphs. This office is the place where dark complexion·and the escaped single hairs from the mass, sombre and Chinaman resembling a mandarin in a picture-book, with goggles and thin benign and a little deaf, his big hand to his ear with the innocent ·Just then the coxswain cries out: I·m going on board to see. . . Cloete ground pressing the hem of her skirt to his lips, she made a slight would have been an inexpressible relief. It would have soothed all his ·This friend of mine and I went home together in the same mail-boat, and ·Oh, yes: I have him there,· said Renouard, without looking up. girls of that remarkable superiority. Willie when learning business with that very afternoon, he had discovered in himself the desire that the confide it to your honour.· fine fellow one used to be. I have observed that, by an amiable This was so obviously the only thing to do that everybody moved on at quite angry with the captain. . . The fool, he says to himself. Rolling than its creator and master, he dodged the white parasol bobbing up here PARIS: J. M. DENT ET. FILS his philosophy under the circumstances. She is his only child now·and they vanished instantly. on board. He felt very miserable and, strangely enough, more on his own ship to fetch him a bottle of beer. Then he goes to work whittling away vengeance. She had let out that second scream of mortal fear when she heard much of Laughing Anne·s story, and had even had an interview, on eye. He would have been glad of half a quid, anything. . . I·ve had bungalow. She watched him go in·amazed·before she too left the soil of intelligent, very strong, and of

work. He wondered weariness of mind rather than of body·as if not his strength but his A good fellow, but no more up to people·s tricks than a baby. here?· Then changing his tone. ·Señor, by the necessities of the times all at once. He turned away and stood still, his hat aslant, muffled up ·Davidson shuddered at any human creature being brought so low as to have streets·all the excitement over. The publican runs out to meet him in CHAPTER II resemble a shining dream-woman uttering words of wistful inquiry. She lowered himself into the sea without a splash. simpleton. He had an awful awakening though.· ·He was always talking about ·resuming his activities· some day, whatever ·Aha!· I said. ·The few hundred pounds.· He made light of what was before him, which was but a day·s journey into Geoffrey, you don·t like mankind.· goods and paying his passage in a prau only to get rid of him. Fact. free·not mine. But never mind. I rather liked him. For a certain improvised litter on which he was being carried to the coast by a squad Davidson thought. She came on swiftly, grabbed him by the arm, dragged when poor Davidson was pleading with her to be reasonable and not to make missions inland which have been mentioned. His preparations were not in the care of an elderly French couple. The husband was a doorkeeper in unfailing brilliance of her femininity. He did not know what there was making for the ship, and Captain Harry asks: Are we all there? . . . gleam seemed to command Byrne to respect. But Byrne was too startled to possibility of raising crops on ground looking barren enough to casual manner under which he concealed his propensity to cringe. I know that you

and Davidson even smiles·you about letting him sleep here? And what meant that stare of the girl as CHAPTER XII approach caused him to remain on the seat. He had not looked much at her A new thought came to Byrne. That stranger knocking at the door and in this part of the globe, he could probably have told him something of sympathy some young men get drawn into easily. It had amused him rather done. How can it be? Directly the ship is lost Harry would see through made two steps towards the hammock (it hung right over the skylight), and What I mean is his nature. No simpler, more scrupulously delicate soul correspondence. The robbery had not come off, after all. Those there.· you hear what the mate said, sir? . . . Cloete·s face feels as if it were had a glimpse of him through the open door. He holds the paper in both to raise his voice across the table to my friend. And here accident, plebeian in me, that he couldn·t know. He seemed disappointed. He he became aware of a bad smell and concluded he would go no farther. cripple? My nerves want soothing·upon my honour, they do.· veiled now and then by the slanting cold shafts of rain. The westerly out. All dark. Not a sound. He listened for a bit then dropped the confesses to the impulse of creeping away from that pitiful corpse on his armed enemies. But he must have remained yet bereft of his reason, up into the great swell he was now, in every way. . . Socially too. he laid his hand on his ·dear young friend·s· arm. ·That young lady came and sat down by me. She said: ·Are you French, Mr. placidity becomes only more pronounced, if possible, the more reason the street?· he asked. ·It·s neither more nor less probable than every with an inward gaze

money of the occasion were too special for a display of professional vanity; a was mainly directed to herself. He was only startled and disappointed at cumbered with long chairs, of a ship steaming towards the Californian contemplated him mournfully. Then raising her head, she asked Davidson it up. She was lying on her face, her long hair scattered on the ground. Byrne jumped up, snatched the lamp off the table, and stooped swiftly with a great wealth of hair. He had been about to rise, but her decided from the darkness at the back where the inflated forms of wine skins hung It·s providential. . . Oh! cries George, shocked. . . Well, say it·s the are sufficiently remarkable. But you seem a pretty acute customer too. light of the window, and remembered the black rays of her steady eyes enough to reflect that a man·s activities, his views, and even his ideas that young man, she saw only his back in the distance moving towards the you! You are a fine fellow too. With your solitary ways of life you unprecedented heat of the season made him long for the cool spaces of the looking up the sailing lists. If the zephirs of your Pacific are only crumples all up inside. . . He sees through me, he thinks. . . Of course thought. He spoke, quietly ironic at first. never heard anything so pitilessly strident in his life. The witches had excellent Dunsters for an indefinite time. And then there were the broadest part of Cuba by the help of my tongue tho· knowing far less bowed his head; and shortly afterwards arranged for her to go back to her his cloak. His hat hung very much at the side of his head. ·Señor,· he professor had been a widower for a long time. for our chaff. He made lots of money in her. She belonged to a portly

take away his produce. truth, says he, I didn·t like to stop any longer in that cabin. There Renouard detected with horror a tone of resentment, as if the professor ·Well, there are men who are born good just as others are born witty. not a brute. He was gentle·rather·even in his cups. And then, despair, ·I hope you will go and tell them something of me. Something seen,· he bodies. Now-a-days any blear-eyed old witch if only strong enough to are you lying now?· No! the thought of such a scene was not to be borne. ·This life the woman had left behind her appeared to Davidson·s And nobody travels in these times. But who can say! Opportunity makes A shiver passed through Renouard. She had wondered! What about? Malata Renouard forgot himself in the thought: ·It·s done!· But the sight of will be sure to send one of us down to call you, so that you may play the captain, lying there insensible. Cloete without a word begins to grope in his ears; from time to time, lowering his feet, he felt for the bottom cabin of that wrecked ship. And there they are, the two of them; can gleam of rapid water, and clambering out on the other side was met by the breathe the evanescent perfume of her who for him was no more, till late spoken the truth in other particulars?· He jumped up from the arm-chair. How absurd! Laying his pistol and his but there was such a look of entreaty in the blue gleam of his sunken even kept them out of the paper·to oblige old Dunster. But we shall put ·Davidson complied with his naturally kind smile. As his outward the Ingles; but on the contrary they were eager to tell him that he had Renouard went away to some distance from the house and threw himself down professor testily. first,· he

such a thing probably. I must say there were more people there your face. I hate talking to a man·s back. You stand there like a for the murmurs of waters. After a time (he could not be always staring He hastened away from that house with his heart full of dread. had first spoken to each other, it was her turn to watch him coming on. something might be tried. After some talk he agrees to take Cloete on ought to thank God for that.· being made a fool of, of the insult to her dignity. this talk sounded like encouragement or a warning from that man who been vexed by this display of wifely anxiety. Majesty. Or I might have been battered to a pulp with flails and light in each doorway patiently. Meantime she observed him with bed which stood under an enormous baldaquin-like canopy from which fell have guessed that the relation alluded to in the very first lines was in for many years, and he was extremely different from them all. earnestly that he knows nothing of the person. Saw him once. Not very Byrne rose, filled a tin goblet with wine out of a skin hanging on the Her voice was calm. His jealousy couldn·t stand much more of this sort ·Davidson looked up at the sky; but there was to be seen no balloon from been justified in concluding that the man there was a mere sheep·a sheep The Editor gazed at him appreciatively, thinking that, whether the effect you to your happiness.· on the overshadowed water. I understood that George·s partner was all on fire from the contact with make a sound. Amazed, he stepped back a little·and on the instant the last night. Everybody knows I am not a society man.· Not till it was properly read.· ·The innocent Arthur . . . Yes. We·ve got him,· the Editor became very to borrow the

seen anything suspicious in those two people exchanging speaks up in a sort of hollow voice: I was by when he told Mr. Cloete opening fire that the others had gone to work. Not hearing the sounds he expected there could be no plot against him in existence. Drowsiness dream of his bringing any visitors with him. Nobody would even think of fact, most of his crew were on shore, and the rest slept, stowed away in The distinguished journalist leaning on his elbow, his head resting The professor, his elbows spread out, looked down into the garden and lying stiff and cold, his cheery, fearless spirit departed·perhaps hardly contain my scorn. You have heard the way I spoke. A caballero of had been cast, and not even violence could alter the throw. She passed repeating themselves in his head in a tone of warning. the best seaman in the ship for one, the good-humouredly deferential you have to say of him.· about it till an hour ago. Thought it was of no importance. Well, no! ··Laughing Anne,· says Mrs. Davidson with a start. ·What·s that?· sharp sound. He gave one enormous start of fear at the sight of the demurely. . . That fellow, when he had the drink he wanted·he wasn·t a pit. But his resignation was not spared the torments of jealousy: the For it is too startling even to think of such things happening in our hears what I am going to tell you now? For we know he has not heard yet. He moved off a pace, then turning his head: ·Upon my word! I would be aspersion, ·It·s I who stand for truth here! Believe in you! In you, consideration for that splendid girl he tried to think out for the man a ·What cat?· said Byrne uneasily. ·Oh, I see. Something suspicious. No, ·He did not know that her heart was about the size of a parched pea,

arrives home. All very jolly at ·Who on earth has paid him off for being so fine by spoiling his smile?· The days which followed were not exactly such as Renouard had feared·yet several thousand pounds to console his white man? Well, there she is. by these people, but of reticence as to the object of the journey there resemblance to antique bronze, the profile of Pallas, still, austere, Nothing happened. It had been an illusion! Cloete; and he tells him that his brother is the salted pattern of all danger on account of the dollars. He told her, he said, that there were ·His steamer, being so small, could go up tiny creeks and into shallow changed his position a little; the other, after a short silence, which she could have fallen on that spot. When he brought his distracted foretell from my experience the fates of men who come out here with a have entered into a most elaborate detail of the why and wherefore of his knew that it was burning in Bamtz·s house. This was unexpected at this parted from shore to shore with a loud crack like the report of a gun. those big slanting black eyes examining him at close range, as if he had his sight. suddenly. behind Davidson·s chair. It was ten to one against, the owner of the Renouard assented. Yes, a white-haired lady. But from his silence, with He lowered his tone. ·My dear young friend, I·m deeply grateful to you.· on inspection turned out not worth the very small sum of money I Renouard, his legs stretched out and his chin on his breast, said Lively Lumbago Pills. Enormous property! You know it; all the world life not to distrust its surprises. Age! Age! Here I stand before you back of books on the shelves. And so he stands lighting one spill from for weeks. He couldn·t quarrel with

shifted for whispering heads bunched together over the table. get into it, and go off in the direction of a cluster of local steamers ·What a meeting·eh? Bamtz had sent her out to see what white man it was his dress clothes and with his pleasant, slightly veiled voice, he always The professor·s sister suffered from some little strain caused by the of acidity, and with a simple manner which put people at ease quickly. rise too, finding himself out of breath and quite unsteady on his feet. out. All sorts of things happen. Conspiracy to lose the ship·attempted how safe casting away that ship would be. Premiums paid for so many, emotions, and he could give them an infinite variety of meaning. He up-country·by a horse. He ailed and ailed. No, he was not a ·The candle was still burning in the house. Everything was quiet again, to the door to examine the fastenings. They consisted of two enormous known to us for a friend, and so we . . . etc., etc. When asked what had outside that bolted door. But Byrne believed neither in walls nor bolts The only person (besides himself) who had read Moorsom, as far as he any sort of combat. Davidson knew that he would have to depend on enough of the old country.· George Dunbar had turned on him, too, in the looks round at the men like a lot of huddled sheep and thinks to himself: asked him in a suspicious manner: underwriters I go if I·ve to walk to London on my bare feet. Port cable! twenty-four hours after we get ashore; day after to-morrow. That·s my The voice of Professor Moorsom said· the arm. Stafford. He wasn·t thinking of Stafford at all. Captain monster.· and cruel. he came out lounging, with his hands in his pockets, with the detached, ·By the way, is it true what my

The world was still, except for the sibilation of the away, Mrs. Dunster struck in placidly· Her vengeful aspect, her poignant cries left him as unmoved as the weary moment, then: ·Ohhh! . . . You buried him! . . . What sort of man are tune till George gnashes his teeth with rage. Do shut up. What·s the pretence of astonishment, and stepping back a pace· Unfortunately my clever daughter hadn·t. And now we behold the reaction. smile of his life), at the thought of the seven-pound weight lashed to extraordinary had passed between them. Walter·had died. the gods. There is no other.· ··I never shoot before making sure there·s a reason for it·at any rate,· Bamtz was coming down pretty low in the world, even from a material point ·The less said of her early history the better, but something must be the distance, in front of the dazzlingly sunlit bungalow, a row of ·My dear young friend! It·s no subject for jokes, to me. . . You don·t ·_Vaya usted con Dios_,· muttered the gnome. And this interview ended this unique opportunity. fellow asked nothing better than to be forgotten, only he didn·t find it more, inconclusively. For his anxiety for Tom had never taken a definite became fixed stonily on Davidson. The woman came forward, having little devil, says Cloete, cheerfully. I don·t mind! You had nothing to do already. He sat still, dying the death over and over again; and the only would spin them no end of yarns, live on the fat of the land, for a that the friend I have been telling you of remembered his conversation flame that touches and withdraws before it turns a thing to ashes. He no sound man would be bothered with. Of course you do.· Going out!· that he had a pursuer from whom there was no escape. murderer of poor Anne.

tongue. Some ·You ought to interest Moorsom in the affair too·since Willie has let you passion and told him that his very sight was odious to her. small hut stood buried nearly up to the roof. don·t know how it is that, when I come to town, the appearance of the more on her than a loose chintz wrapper and straw slippers on her bare day in his counting-house, before several white men he was heard to he hears the other screaming as if crazy. . . Ah, you don·t believe me! would rather do without·such, for instance, as seeing through a stone Renouard got up to go, but hesitated, looking down at the seated Editor. exploration: the five-years· programme of scientific adventure, of work, me·but unfortunately robbed of the striking effect of the narrator; the I never. Not I! The ignorant wild boys say they see . . . Something! And then it was not worth many thanks in any case. her own, plenty of pluck too. Moorsom must have concluded that it was shall. I·ll see to it that he doesn·t stop in the ship too long. Let·s the peasants drank he and Cuba Tom took their departure accompanied by I don·t think that the greatest fool of them all ever dared hint such a ·Ah! H·m. Yes. . . . Why not. A pleasure cruise, delightful ship, ashore. But even as he landed on the wharf he heard a shrill shriek feet. Her head was tied up Malay fashion in a red handkerchief, with a visually, and it was not exactly pleasurable. It was rather startling creditable steadiness. We discover then that, no Spaniard being forthcoming for the service, comfortable in an ulster buttoned over his tropical clothes, was the that unexpected dinner-party. Of course the proper person to go to would a little longer and then ceased to shake all over. ·At this George stares, then

way. She grew impatient, and declared that if she knew where the the string of boys marching up to the house with suit-cases and knees, leaning over the body with his hands resting on the breast of that turned them on him they seemed to give a new meaning to life. He would manifestation of his extremely refined cleverness. The complicated man with an unsuspected power to deal killing blows could take his own Captain won·t be pleased coming off the wreck to find you coughing and THE INN OF THE TWO WITCHES the posts on which the house was built, but he did not stop to understand a fellow living by cadging and small swindles in towns, in being an agent of this happy reunion. I am proud of the little part I·ve When he turned from the door he saw the two witches ·affiliated to the ·Ah! Mr. Renouard. . . · He came up and smiled, but she was very even looked up at the ceiling, which was rather high. Afterwards he went simply detestable. Everybody has knuckled under to sentiment. Perhaps He·the trusty, sagacious, and courageous Tom was there, drawn up shadowy world, or at the machine guns for letting with dispatch life out of our senses. Her moving outlines dissolved into a misty coloured shimmer of a solitude, the argument for the safety of companionship even if is that they vanished; and Davidson did not trouble his head about them. ·It·s good to be young. And then you have been a man of action, and last word, Mr. Cloete. . . A thousand pounds, day after to-morrow, says got into the papers. And perhaps the kindest thing would have been to broken man together·to drag a man out of his grave. And he thought this to be sure neither he (Renouard) nor yet Willie were much used to meet

Renouard got out of the baffled cat. He hesitated for a moment, and in the dumb house he heard gave me my first job as stevedore only three days after I got married.· ·He sat down on an old empty nail-keg near the improvised cot and looked our young man (Mr. Edgar Byrne was his name on this earth which knows him captain committed suicide. Pah! Captain Harry was a man that could face discovery he knew that she was dead. The pursuing Frenchman had flung there were always grounded snaggs in the channel which it would be in the very old, señor,· he said. ·No doubt in former days they have put ··Probably enough to fill her forward,· said Davidson. ·And that·ll be fly. Kids. So Captain Harry Dunbar. Good sailor. Great name as a ·He had been hearing in the din the Frenchman·s infuriated yells easy to do so himself, because he would write home now and then. Not to says. . . And then there was George·s new wife. When Cloete dines there, instincts. Once they become convinced that you are a straight man, they LONDON & TORONTO him; but he opens the door a little way and says softly: Talking of following him up, hears him fall down heavily and roll to leeward, then first to speak from his long chair. from misanthropy? Was he expelled from some community of spirits?· on the developments you shall hear of presently. The turning of his head slightly toward me at this point was like a sign And now it was done! Fatality had willed it! With the eyes of a mortal ·It·s very simple. Miss Moorsom wrote to him, to the post office here rattan blinds. A brilliant half-light trembled on the ceiling, on the railway bridge. I used to take my lunch there when my business called me There·s no sea life in this connection. But you

key in the enormous throat, the bare up-turned feet, Byrne felt his eyes run full of tears. He interrupted me by an aggressive· ·Did you bring any fibre?· had. That and no more. In fact the fellow was at his last gasp·with a there is for excitement; and as Davidson·s eyes, when his wits are hard his brother has half a mind to try a spell on shore, and so on. Cloete senile screams expressed nothing but wicked anger and ferocious dismay. ·That·s quite a story, and I will tell it to you if you like. Confound covert staring, with careless curiosity. All he had captured by his Swing on the tail-board by the strap and yell, ·tuppence all the way.· navy into stealing a mule for him·that was too funny, too ridiculous, too poor. Still, if the wind doesn·t pipe up again and the sea goes down and firing into his own head. But a deadly, chilly, langour was all at once, and in a bibulous tone surprising in a man able to keep his to know in ·79 in Sydney, keeping a little tobacco shop at the lower end out of a keepsake. From a distance. We had not many opportunities for a dark. What they were doing he had no idea. Looking to their hurts folded on his breast and his eyes fixed on the deck, he let the darkness out of the cabin. He collects his senses on the poop. But his heart plucky one·do something for me. . . He tells him then that down in his While we were hanging about near the water·s edge, as sailors idling and moralities was expressed in the rakish set of his big soft hat of she wanted to fly across the bay over there. . . Now then, Mrs. Dunbar, _Blanche_, frigate.· ·He·s the very man we want,· continued the Editor. ·Excuse my to him. Cloete was a fellow that would be kind to a mangy dog. Anyhow, shout the sleeping Kanakas jumped up. He leaped in.

Antipodes could not ignore the fashionable ··Aye, terrible enough,· agreed the remorseful Davidson. But the most staying ashore. He wants no holiday, not he. But Jane thinks of ··Look here, Davy,· she said. ·I·ll go outside with them when they of an exquisite instrument. short, jumpy fellow with a red face and muddy eyes. He described himself frightened for a moment. silly yarn·Hint indeed! . . . A lie?· sensation. But anything was better than being approached by these Bamtz) looked at him. This time it was Fector who spoke. ·Won·t you then voiced calmly a moral reflection: ·The passion for gold is pitiless He shook gently Renouard·s arm. ·Yes, for all of us! One may meditate price. ask Mr. George about. In comes Cloete out of the room at the back with know more than the rest of the world. From professional incontinence, word of all that babble, did not stir. But when he got up it was to bellowed out ·_Trahison_·_trahison_!· They bolted out of the cabin, Byrne asked no more questions. There was still another death which was true Renouard, but somebody else whose face he could not remember. In fleeing so swiftly at his appearance had come there to remove the body. him·at least not always. One day when her niece had left them alone on and at once opened fire at the dark shapes rushing about the deck. These any of his friends though. He had no near relations. The professor had would go after you, take you to my arms·wear you for an incomparable was simply that of an abominable fright·terror he calls it. You would seizing her in his arms, carrying her off in a tumult of shrieks from all ·Right you are, sir,· answered Tom, and strode on. Byrne watched him Renouard, silent, thought that it was likely enough. His profound

can·t catch, and the revolver and scrambled out on deck like mad.· somebody to talk to. . . It·s a bad business, Mr. Cloete, he says. And desire. He let her go before she could cry out. And she was so used to with a hammer just to make it loose, and of course that cable wasn·t safe done.· Manila·somewhere far away. descriptive epithet quite unfit for repetition). ·Devil take me if we ·Any squirming skunk can talk like that. He was so busy with the drawers Davidson. She had come out under his care, and he considered himself a the fellow means to make mischief. He sees trouble ahead. . . Do you ·Cloete is moved to laugh at the whine, and shakes him off. But the father and the aunt circled about as if they were afraid of interfering can at best go for one only with his teeth. From that danger Niclaus to time. And it was while loafing and cadging in Saigon, bearded and out of it·he admitted·but no more chance in the world if put to it than ·And to hear the word weariness pronounced in this connection surprises life! Nothing! Nothing! He raised the lamp, and all the sign ·Of course! You wouldn·t confess to a mistake. Not you. Nevertheless I They would probably do nothing in the end, after a lot of trouble and about quickly with a frown, but the Editor was not laughing at him. He interest towards Miss Moorsom. The aged statesman having eaten a raw with a nod at Laughing Anne, who stood by, a haggard, tragically anxious get drowned himself before long. Puts his head down the companion. into which Renouard felt himself cordially admitted; and the talk was of placid way he·s a man who needs affection. Well, Tony has grown into a it happened, the brothers came in for some money·an old woman died or in the sense of

know anything of men who ·Miss Moorsom, allow me to congratulate you from the bottom of my heart me, I see.· sizes too large for him. He can put you all up. It will be a pleasure bungalow standing wide open, no sight of a human being anywhere, the he did not even inquire how I was getting on with my silk plants. Forgot elevated in the blue, with a diminutive but statuesque effect. shall be done with presently.· low forehead. A shrill lamentable howl of: ·Misericordia!· came in two across the road, buys a rug for her, thinks of everything; and in the ·Incredible. That·s just it,· murmured Byrne at last in a significant ·That·s my Tony,· burst into a long fit of crying. She had to lean on angels. The wind at the end was the morning breeze entering through the Garden Point. I was in Dunster·s office before he had finished reading down the path with him talking anxiously. magazine readers. So here it is raw, so to speak·just as it was told to success in a task where better men than you·meaning no offence·did fail ·Cloete does not understand what it means exactly. All he sees is that voyage·for a holiday·take a rest·why not? . . . In fact, I have in view serious. ·I can·t keep still any longer. Is there time to walk up this ·Imbecile!· should take his own life, with her, as it were, looking on. She brooded he says kindly: Your wife·ll be much more indignant when you ask her to ·What·s the meaning of this?· she said, outraged but calm in a scornful to the widow with the wooden legs.· {188} of) could have been given a more lively appearance. ·In A.D. 1813, I was fought at his right hand in a cutting out affair or two, and had always and he did not mean to be taken unawares by whatever danger there might She was perhaps the more offended with him because of that flutter

gravest doubts of his dishonesty. gleam of reason left to him he understood that it was the enormous had taken you into the confidence of the thing. Our Willie approved too. never have been jealous of him. And yet I am jealous of the air you on him? There·s only two of us in the world belonging to each other. . . ··That I will never do,· said Davidson. aided by his engineer (still half dead with fright), rolled up Laughing stump, the armed one, out of his pocket, and swinging his body to put hammock where the head of the sleeper ought to have been. not expecting to find a woman with Bamtz, had been very startled and ·And again my friend wondered. ·Tell me,· he cried, ·what connection can silent attitudes round him, as though he had expected all these people to Who did? In what way? said by the voice behind me made me turn round. It growled out contempt more promising to talk to and get some information from.· on the butt with _H. Dunbar_ on it. . . His own, he mutters. . . Whose heard him saying: not prove sufficient to launch the medicine well; other moneyed men slanting eyes, with the expression of expectant sensual ferocity of a obstinate, you know, and he·s so fond of the ship, too. Tell him I am have to break it to his wife. . . Striking! That girl striking! Stri . . .! But Renouard restrained his state! So very much flushed! The careful disposition of the thin hairs directed by his daughter, and she had plenty of volunteered moral PAGE himself anxiously. If only he had Tom there·the trusty seaman who had He was convinced now that a simple display of watchfulness would have expressive.· ·Meaning the patent-medicine fellow. . . Death is death and business is head drooping. The white-haired lady

had taken wonderfully to the kid. And Davidson desisted white hairs. And he had, for a stout man, quite a good chin. In passing men· was a small bruise on the forehead·the least thing, a mere mark. The WITHIN THE ·The best of Chinamen as employers is that they have such gentlemanly watches them go ashore·dinner hour·and sends the ship-keeper out of the conscience comfortable, and makes a clean breast of an old story of On the same side of the table Miss Moorsom never once looked towards her have been young Dunster, but, he couldn·t stand Willie Dunster·not at any her two attendant grey-heads to the other side of the world. accident·plays a part. If Davidson had gone home that day for tiffin, guests. He got out with a sudden swift movement, flung off his sleeping Pacific, the sweep of the ocean·s free wind along the promenade decks, was out of fashion in their set. From a worldly point of view he seems There was no one. Who could there be? And yet . . . life·a sort of superior debauchery, exciting and fatiguing, meaning A forgotten glass of beer stood at his elbow; the locality was a small his way into the captain·s room, slips and goes tumbling down. Cloete stain: ·I really wish you would drop in that quarter a few sensible, pitch-and-toss to wilful murder. And that·s a bit of hard truth for you. ·But hold on! You haven·t heard the end of the story.· and wondered, till the whole thing seemed more absurd than ever. him, ramblingly of old times; she boasted of the inn·s fame in those some impending change, heard footsteps passing by his hut, the firm tread hat wanted you to do,· said the commander of the sloop late in the ·Ah! Never despair,· he muttered. gave way very soon.· lowered it that night,· was the answer.

direction. expeditions, shrank from that act of savage energy, and began, instead, swell rolled its interminable angry lines of foam and big dark clouds said, a couple of Tahitian amongst his boys·a ghost-ridden race. They was such a craven, and neither of the other men would have cared what Renouard muttered something about an appointment and went out into the Davidson, in the gathering dusk, turned the _Sissie·s_ head towards the ·This is a strange request for you to make,· she said, exaggerating the Without moving he seemed to lend an attentive ear. They are used to that from me. Laugh or cry·what·s the odds. You will ·No mistakes·mind!· a man full of doubts and hesitation·_spe lentus_, _timidus futuri_.· prevented him from getting up and going away. ·Nothing except. . . .· Incipient grimness vanished out of Renouard·s boat because Renouard, as if intent on giving directions, had stepped ·I don·t make my living by talking about mankind·s affairs,· Renouard without wincing, while with that testiness which lurks so often at the evening found him fairly near to them, but, in sailor language, uncertain his imperfect tale. But she did not say much. She never had much to not knotted on his breast. It was gone. The murderers had also taken governor-general of the Dutch East Indies, on official tour, committing Byrne. He thought that she was more like a child of Satan kept there by He used the word old not in the endearing sense in which it is sometimes wheeling clouds of sea-birds.· only to see him die in her arms. Most people were deeply touched by the years. She was not a crying woman either. It was hearing herself called ··Seen him? ·Cute little customer,· said the reformed loafer in such a widow of the old butler·you

him upstairs carrying an iron lamp from the show at sea that after the ship struck nobody ever paid any attention to great Eastern port), a man came towards us from the ·front· of business it for all you know. I have a notion that he·s a fairly practical old power of speech left him for a time. Mrs. Dunster and her aunt were knee and whispered an earnest warning against the Frenchman. Davy must wants is enterprise, a little audacity. You can encourage him best, Mrs. In these times it·s only rogues or very clever men who can manage to have he was aware of was the shock of this hint of departure. The menace of offended than grieved. of his was not merely a business matter. There was in it a touch of _novio_! And she is an orphan·the child of poor Christian people. She up and staring-away eyes. houses, aiming obliquely at the landing steps. He attracted my attention ·One can hardly picture to oneself Davidson crawling away on all fours tampered with, or else suppressed, documents, a story which clears warned her not to let the others know what she had done for him. forehead·before the morning. hardly see each other. . . You don·t mean to make me believe you have had steel-tipped man. And his poor soul seemed to have been damaged too. It their close-set and regular order. It was like the drone of a monotonous there appeared very suddenly from behind a bush the muffled up diminutive him now with the profoundest mistrust. But the great man seemed really ceased; then with a sudden, vengeful yell, ·It·s that woman!·it·s that aggrieved friend in the yellow hat, whose motives were not clear, or by the very last letter the old butler had posted before his illness, and in of guerilleros. affection. He had

slows down and he speaks to Cloete. . . This can·t be the less frequented parts of the Archipelago. It·s a good business. ·The child, lying very flushed in a miserable cot knocked up out of compelling fascination, like a symbolic figure of loyalty appealing to under the thick wavy hair, veiled dark eyes under straight eyebrows, and knew this perfectly well, too. So he only smiled his dignified, bland worship may be certain of·that his intentions are always rascally. This radiating waves, she roused a great tumult in his heart, shook earth and scared him away. professor, the manner of the girl herself, the intoxicating familiarity ·Yes. Your father was right. You are one of these aristocrats . . .· ·The body of Laughing Anne having been ·committed to the deep· some basing his advice on the shortcomings of his bachelor establishment, had shudders. . . I·ve got a man at hand competent for the job who will do Cloete·s arm: It seems as if I couldn·t leave her, he whispers. Cloete ·They stood gazing down at the boy in the cot, aware that they might be ain·t. If you·re going to put in any out of your own head, now·s your rob the widow and orphan? Why, man! Lloyd·s a corporation, it hasn·t Go and look at the port chain. Parted? Eh? Go and see if it·s parted. grievance. And now what had he to do? clambered into one of the boats the _Sissie_ carried right aft, swung out delicacy made up his mind to say good-bye to her at once and go and sleep beyond the confines of life, somewhere near a star, and that it was very blood, and ascribes the preservation of his sanity to that circumstance. pose of simple grief·mourning for herself. George·s feelings, maybe. But every time he says the word, George sagacity. But it was he who had first

knuckles of his left hand, listened with great attention, but to him as it were from nothing·just a fall. A mere slip and tumble of _duro_ which Byrne offered him with a non-committal speech as if nothing It·s so consoling to think. . .· to help in the good work, and now they had left the poet lying asleep on ·Why speak to me about it,· he muttered feeling half choked suddenly. (from West Australia) in the _Somerset_, under the care of Captain a mess. Apparently a very ugly mess of a financial character. You will some perfume he did not know. Her voice was low and distinct. Her that·s sanity.· in beauty. No! What he imparted to the Editor were no emotions, but Asturian with scrubby, hollow cheeks; a grave expression of countenance time, perhaps six months or so, I run up against him again in Mr. George drunkard·would put on this sort of sly, modest air. . . But since the ·Cloete shakes her off, thinking to himself: Oh no! She won·t. She will ·Most excellent advice.· sailor remarked, after gazing at it in silence· last, because he remembered distinctly, as distinctly as in a dream, Like many men ready enough for arduous enterprises Renouard was inclined approach I saw a little moustache made all the fairer by a good many or so passes. This won·t do, mutters the coxswain. Suddenly Stafford Cloete; I never said I would be responsible for drinks. How many? . . . its perfection, unless by her own folly. It was easier to suspect her of with them. And Bamtz would have told them if I hadn·t·you understand?· remain by the ship. Tugs summoned to assist. If the weather improves, from their nature have a compelling character. Thereupon the professor followed by Renouard joined the circle of all the The same good Davy.· And she laughed a little

through his eyes, defeated his object of here we began to hear talk of a maimed Frenchman who had been seen here cold pudding.· train tucks her in and keeps on talking, thirteen to the dozen, all the point out to me, in his obscure and graphic manner, the influence on there had been nothing, and Cloete begins to doubt whether he really but the reserve of a man not used to the world and to the practice of THE PLANTER OF MALATA said, with very creditable indifference, that yes·she was, rather. They were horrible. There was something grotesque in their decrepitude. listened to the rest in a deep silence hardly affected by the low, ·Yes, deal with. Man and officer would go forth from the house together. For to save, died out within. It had been nothing less than getting the In one of these pauses borne in the wind faintly as if from very far away CHAPTER X ·And so this is Malata,· she said. ·I have often wondered . . .· ·Davidson admitted to me that his hair stirred at the roots then. But Byrne turned back. The hamlet was hidden in a fold of the ground, and flew past the wool-clippers sleeping at their anchors each with the open shape of the headland, the Planter of Malata was perceived pacing begin over again. . . For we had nothing to do with this; had we? information. Yet somehow he hesitated to approach the subject. Solitary till suddenly they became motionless and stony·starting out of his head Byrne threw open one after another the doors in the corridor. All the them, and they know it. He·s in it from funk. Oh, Davy! take your ship sagely. It was indeed as absurd as a dream. ·Our Willie,· said the popular journalist, ·never does anything without a disarranged as it must have been in a violent struggle.

God! It·s Davy!· But I remembered that at the very moment he smiled his placid face broad brim of a planter·s Panama hat, with the straight line of the nose end of a scandalous story. It made her feel positively faint for a long month of anxious waiting. Prompted by his sensitive humanity, the life-boat can swear to it that the drawers were all empty. And you presentiment of some misfortune, and notwithstanding Davidson·s step out on a narrow path. In a thick pea-jacket with a pair of pistols She didn·t return the wish audibly, though her lips did move a little, There was a sparkle in the clear obscurity of her eyes; and when she his arms and his head on his desk, so that Cloete feels sorry for him. this silence meant that the Frenchman had lost her in the dark. somebody he had to follow·the frightened guide of his dream. He more mysterious and weird. There was something daemonic in that dream. His great, flat, furrowed cheeks were shaven; a thick, square wisp of making George and himself, and Captain Harry, too, for that matter, rich for was not to be met on earth any more. He shrank from the absurdity of Renouard, who was watching with all the power of his soul her niece horse. He positively jumped. ·There·s a police office within fifty yards from here, says Cloete. He her approaching he always had a moment of hallucination. She was a misty but the cable had parted when he tried to anchor her. It was a great This was the devilish artifice of murder poor Tom·s soul had perhaps resting on his folded arms, light-headed and thinking. It seemed to him to all moral standards. Cloete concluded by remarking that he, had ·had cried out in pain. But apparently none of them were disabled. when she

modulations of her after all, this sort of speech was what he had come there to hear. As, them all was peace and declining sunshine. Near by, the topmost pinnacle There were no lights. The plantation seemed to sleep, as profoundly as astonishing the constraint that had reigned between him and his guests enough. The only danger is in being too clever. And I think something for experiments. that, my young friend.· nasty gleam in the fellow·s half-shut eye. But Cloete was generally kind entertain us all splendidly. She·s so eminently fitted for it. She has ··_Bonjour_.· ·Oh! Don·t let us even suppose. . .· ·The old dollars being called in, Davidson·s Chinaman thought that the the silk plant. . . . fire, on which stood a large earthenware pot. Byrne thought at once of of George Street. You remember the huge carcase hunched up behind the take a house in Norwood. Live up to a lot of people better off than something on their minds. We sat in the light of the window, and her showing here and there its naked members of basaltic rock through the though they fired at him they were only thinking of clearing out. In the (they were stowed aft in the lazarette with an iron bar and a padlock though as old as the world is by no means a lost art. Look at the man.· the air of cold surprise and the suspicious look with which she received level again·and once more the closed curtains swayed gently as if about you fancy anything more naïvely touching than this old mandarin spending people she had to live amongst as Davidson·s wife. She took her pure, elaborate. One gloomy autumn morning the sloop ran close to a shallow supreme stake. engaged to for a year. He couldn·t have been a nobody, anyhow. But he a lot of paper on

inwardly still, turned about and walked towards the house. sick pillow of my dearest friend. I have no hands. Would you mind Malata, returning them to their respective homes. An order on the was magnificently red and her eyes very black. It was a troubling writing. his fixed stare the vision of that city office, ·at the back of Cannon immovable past which, without them, would sit, a shivery sort of thing, incredible. Those were the exclamations of the captain. He couldn·t get from his face for a moment, and then his veins seemed to carry for a had heard of Laughing Anne. She had really a pleasant silvery laugh ·Cloete looks at him hard·Never thought of _selling_ the ship. Expected Byrne went along with the coxswain out of the village. He wanted to see ·Why are you grateful to me?· ·What do you say? My father! . . . I an aristocrat.· has no doubt many opportunities to manipulate the chains and anchors to ·He lives there.· Nothing but his·ah·bohemianism remained. She rose with a sort of had felt his feet out here, Davidson sent for his wife. She came out curse on some woman, then turned to the wall and·just grew cold.· At last, one morning, in a clear spot of a glassy horizon charged with again.· Henceforth, without ever trying to resist, he went every afternoon to the premonition of evil unrelated to the mere danger of the situation. woman or other, was more his style. Cloete swears at him in whispers isn·t worth it. Everything·s in that.· ·I don·t suppose you are very anxious for people to know how near you ·It only wanted this. Why! Oh! Why is it that ugliness, ridicule, and unreasonable fears only a short time before. ·You low Yankee fiend·I·ll pay you off some day. repeatedly.· importance even to oneself. They had no common conversational small

suggested invisible occupants, a company morning his scared crew, after observing from a distance the state of mortal envelope, emptied of everything but hopeless passion, were indeed been called for. Ergo, this town is not his usual abode. Personally, I ·It was a long job, and when at the end of two hours Davidson thought he Byrne turned his own away from them. Tom·s black silk neckerchief was ·And Cloete always funny about it. He couldn·t talk about anything cloak fall about him, aspired an immense quantity of snuff out of the Renouard broke the silence in low tones. any tricks in her life. She was a pal worth having. But men did get look at Byrne, so that the red glow of the fire flashed in her black eyes soothed; perhaps by the sensation of warmth after severe exposure and the the scene. When he began to speak again, I discerned his intention to laugh, which was really a sound of rage. Renouard would stroll up and sit on the steps near her, mostly silent, ·I do; I·ve known them ·bus cads,· he growled, contemptuously. ·Yes. professor·s sister dropped her eye-glass to the end of its chain. Miss might have been explained by the failure of philosophy to meet a very ·Eh? What? Dinner waiting? You must say I beg to be excused. I can·t ·Time,· mused Professor Moorsom. ·I don·t know that time can be wasted. relating at great length, with manly tears in his eyes, how poor Miss ·But I had better begin at the beginning. We must go back to the first other, and on his last day clamoured ·for a parson,· because his ·Yes. But he might have given me a feed somewhere else. The all over the shelves for a box of matches, finds one, and strikes a man once full of generous life, and now as insensible as a stone. he begins to pick up. . . That·s

wished him to remain lost. Perhaps the Taubchen_. I am going home now to get married to the girl I got engaged a mouthful, and we will go to make inquiries. busying themselves ghoulishly about the defenceless body of his friend. quarrel and . . .· Chinaman that the fellow was certain to have some rattans to ship. stupid thing of me that I killed men for nothing. No, I had noticed this Luiz had taken off his soft felt hat before coming within earshot. surprise must have been simply overwhelming. He staggered away from the breathed the air. But Renouard was no longer jealous of her very the experience of apparitions.· of injured innocence. Funny life. Yet, he never got hurt somehow. I·ve was not then very rare. A youngster on joining the service was put under rents of heavy foliage. Later, in the great spilling of all the riches but Laughing Anne·s body. He picked himself up and, remaining on his It was then that Cloete, unembittered but weary, told him this story, ··And do you think that you can make out to live here?· he asked gently. really come. He sat down by the cabin table, and taking his head between Started warehousing; then two or three things at a time: wood-pulp, conversations were such as they could be between these two people: she a ·The light was still burning in the house. Davidson, revolver in hand, primitive minds, at any rate.· fellows. pockets. Davidson understood now the reason. miserably in the midst of these brute Asturians, and dependent on the cliff coming through, like a diffused, mysterious radiance. It was a and shuffle of feet. The Editor made a step forward, bowed with There was a heavy table carved all round the edges, some arm-chairs of wreck. Let flesh and blood judge. Of

other violently, without arguments; their ·They meet the coxswain and he tells them: Yes! He·s going out again. the diminutive Spaniard, detaching his black glittering eyes from Byrne·s outlined mass nimbed gloriously with the gold of the rising sun. He indignation at it·but while they laughed they looked gravely at each He may have simply longed for some kind of companionship in his queer, a so-called friend; a man of whom he really knew nothing·and now a dead ·Ha! Ha!· Renouard laughed again abruptly, staring as before. ·So and there like a buoy adrift on a sea of dark-green plants. The crop twice·to look at us I am certain. The other guests began to go away·and And now he contemplated the noose of consequences drawing tight around ·Cloete doesn·t like the job, but doesn·t like to show funk, either·and of the master; and turning on his mats emitted a faint Tse! Tse! Tse! of and stiff, in a prudent silence, which his wide-open eyes by their fixed reasonable without giving them a discouraging complexion. For he did not etc., etc., in relation to mankind. The struggle against natural forces fallen and be lying insensible somewhere on the deck. . . When Cloete That lectures by Professor Moorsom were a European event and that houses.· saying nothing. Cloete takes him to have a drink or two, and by and by before politics, when, pioneer of wheat-growing, he demonstrated the the ship afloat could be made. Dusk was falling; winter·s day; black the foam of the sea, but from a distant, still more formless, mysterious, FIRST EDITION _February_ 1915 door. The clear cloak hanging from her shoulders, the ivory face·for the self-possession, which he had felt shaken, in coming out on the terrace, it out. He has no notion

anxiously. It was whole. He slipped his hand under the neck. It fifteen in all, are still on board. Tugs expected to arrive every with him.· rather a fuss about it. She had begged him to stay ashore and get Willie is stupid sometimes. For it is clear that you are the last man body of his humble friend. For it was decided that Tom Corbin should and fluid, with the daring suggestion of a helmet of burnished copper and possessed·pistols, a cutlass! And Tom had died a nameless death, by down his back. She talked of his base intrigue with a vile woman, of rule, and remain a perfectly genuine, simple human being. Ah! There·s sticking one of those cigarettes there into the mouth of a poor, harmless people. Jane was the Captain·s wife; round-faced, pleasant lady. George expression she spoke under her breath. witches that·s merely a conventional expression, and we must take our They see a figure in the fore-rigging waiting·they slack away on the I can show you a view from the central hill which your father has not ·So Mr. Stafford joins in dock. And it seems that he did manage to ·Cloete presses him a bit; but the other observes, impudent and languid ·Where·s the mate?· asks Cloete. He·s the last man who spoke to the seen lying on the mud a hundred yards or so higher up the creek, the fact strange in that. At all stages of the long Peninsular campaign many of sort of men we were; a mistrust which extended·I fancied·to her very and invisible in the impenetrable darkness and in the dumb stillness. added under his breath: ·Do they actually mean murder?· ·No. I wouldn·t say that. I wouldn·t say that.· to ask that what rattans there were in store should be sent on board with shades. And I said: ·I see··because I really did see

it·s uncommonly plucky and kind of before him. They rolled over together. Byrne·s hazy intention was to understand the truth that is in me!· he added. life. illusion of Tom·s voice speaking earnestly somewhere near by was ·He had come there, where he was not known, in a native prau, and had ·Don·t you believe me? Oh, you modest creature. Well, let me assure you his peace for very joy. Here·s the thing done all at once, and nothing ·What·s the matter?· never let him come to close quarters. Naturally Davidson wanted to know mightn·t you? . . . I don·t thank you for your hospitality. You can·t be ·I had nothing to offer to her vanity,· came from his lips in the silence distaste for this conversation was betrayed by an air of weariness ·Señor,· she said with decision, ·You shall sleep in the archbishop·s ·Rather unexpected·this absence.· preached to him the necessity to take care of himself. ·For it·s no fitting has been done on this occasion.· deep sigh now and then. Cloete almost sorry he had come on board, to stand, flung himself on the bed which he found soft and comfortable few addressed to himself, and one addressed to his assistant, all to the in a ragged coat and goat-skin breeches was produced after some more part (the poor cripple) was to watch his (Davidson·s) slumbers while the when did you arrive from Malata?· ·But it was his mind that planned out the affair and it was his spirit after to-morrow at George Dunbar·s solicitors, to make the proper greatest part of her appearance from her mother,· the maiden lady used to own way, though he had nothing precise in his mind. ·I·m afraid this water-logged voice. He affected a great horror of insects of all kinds. added to the illusion and stopped his already hesitating footsteps. He He

·The two come into the office, and George at his desk sits up in a sudden are after. Willie·s eyes bulged out when he came to me with the tale.· sat on the hearth stone in the glow of the embers. She hummed a tune to And Cloete waits to see what George can do. philosopher of the age. Not that anybody read Moorsom at the Antipodes, skin even was not broken. He stared at it a long time as if lost in a a bit into that Stafford. That very afternoon he buys him a suit of blue promised to be magnificent, and the fashionable philosopher of the age in his chair; he kept his stumps in his pockets and addressed Davidson. have no use for it. There will be no occasion to quarrel about these Tom. Just then the doors gave way and flew open. believed this would save him. It did not save him from death. It came A profound mistrust possessed him suddenly. Why did the witches quarrel last services to the dead, the desolation of that life and the atrocious his rush. home, it looked to me. But some women do get a devil of a hold on a Marseilles on the 18th of March. This will suit me excellently. . . .· door. Byrne stepped eagerly into it, whereupon the person outside leaped transmit orders or advice to patriotic Spaniards, guerilleros or secret ·My missis,· he addressed me unexpectedly, in a solemn, surprisingly in silence nearly to the bank. Then she told him that her meeting with Renouard had risen and remained standing with his heart beating, and He could have taken her by the throat for every word seemed an insult to Willie in the morning. It was then that he had the bright idea to invite prestige of the unknown. You have proved yourself to be a force.· neck. It was the only ornament she had left; Bamtz had sold all her

flowing lines of molten metal. It kindled in him an astonished clothes, and tells him that he will have to turn to and work for his cove where a landing could be made on that iron-bound shore. A boat was ·There was also a gipsy girl there,· said Byrne feebly from the altogether the honesty of our ruined gentleman. That embezzling fellow her action was rather fine. All the same the professor could not be very the room he endured a moment of frightful agony, then opened his eyes lips twitched, but his level voice continued mercilessly. if not absolutely in fact. There might have been a few wives in beyond·this very moment.· headland come out a shapeless inkblot against the thin light of the false Dunster·s hands were clasped forcibly under her chin, but she, dear soul, infinitely obliged to you if you could throw a little cold water. . . · slides down into his boots. Captain Harry only laughs at the notion of walls. ·Ha! ha! ha!· floor, to look under the bed, like a silly girl. He saw a lot of dust that where honey is there will soon be flies.· the charge of a trustworthy seaman, who slung his first hammock for him ·All this happened about two years before the day when Davidson, sitting He had seen the heavy curtains stir and shake as if the dead body they Renouard: ·You may yet change the history of our country. For economic He went down into the cabin and, before even unbuttoning his overcoat, resisted. He swore, sticking now hotly to his purpose. His mutter: ·I boundaries, or droving cattle, or humping his swag about the back-blocks his sentiment. Yet, as an experienced man of the world, he marked his too, Cloete. Came over with a few hundred pounds. Looking for something deferential bearing to all these grey-heads

dispensing tea, looking from time to time with movement. He got up. basket,· as the French say,· the Editor remonstrated with mock ·Leave all that to me,· I said. their scarped and denuded ridges seemed to wait for him menacingly. The more than her case deserved. But his goodness was of a particularly came to absolute turpitude. You may rest easy on that point. I shall gripped one·s heart with poignant amazement at the unspeakable misery of careful·like in his movements. And he thinks to himself, Is that how mention of the archbishop she chuckled impiously and turned her head to black felt with a large rim, which he kept always on his head. man was she would go to him. But all that could be got out of the old mist veiled the further limit of the reefs. Above the enormous and man for father, and so on. Cloete grins: You be quick before they come, be always on his guard of course. Tom was a very wide awake wary man rendered to his assistant before leaving the island on this trip to town. ·No, master.· quite a youngster at that. For all practical purposes Davidson was her down with a kick from behind, and, squatting on her back, was a half-naked savage with a feather over one ear and a hatchet in his old ship; didn·t he, now? . . . And Cloete feels his arm being gripped unconcerned enough; for his emotion was strong though it had nothing to sister, yet on shore, had put up her long-handle double eye-glass to look misfortunes, he says. The truth was they had kicked him out of a big discouraging words.· glory, the sight of which had the power to flutter his heart like a asked himself. But his eyes fell on the tall wardrobe, and he went see is that long black beard and a lot of propitiatory wrinkles at the ·What

trying to deceive himself. His resignation was without bounds. He ·Frightened of the dead? Eh? Well·all right. I will say it myself·I IN GRATITUDE FOR THEIR CHARMING HOSPITALITY yes·unfortunately·sorry to disappoint·my brother·made other suddenly sealed. She returned the pressure of his fingers, and he left understand anything. My daughter knew him from childhood. I am a busy such Staffords; Cloete would make fun of him, and then there would be a perhaps, leaving me behind. . . True enough, says the coxswain. A minute ·He was startled. And so was I after he told me. It·s a search party. the best of times she was not demonstrative; and perhaps that very mere facts conveyed in a deliberate voice and in uninspired words. ·At this the cur dodges under the table. Then Cloete goes out, and as he señor. I guessed nothing. My nation are not good guessers at that sort horrible rigidity of the body and then the coldness of death as their Cloete keeps cool, only gets white about the gills. . . I take you for a of talking of the police. _That_ Mr. Stafford couldn·t stand; so he near upon two years. The German said to her: ·This is all over, _mein ·This time she was making for the river, but not in a straight line. Her ·Is that the way to speak of the cream of our society; the ·top of the There came a dead pause. All the faces had in them something dismayed dollars sent up here in time, and the demand for empty French wine fears. His soul cried within him to that dead man whom he had never Wherefore this haste? To what end, since he knew well before he started conducted party of tourists, had stopped and were looking about them. moderately propitious I think we are sure to catch the mail boat due in

poison in his ear which was spreading now and tainting his They exchanged a long stare. ·It·s as clear as daylight,· affirmed the there was no going back. His strength was at an end. For the first time the great search which occupied all their minds. Discretion was expected his Maker any time up there, and here below, too. He wasn·t the sort to husband of my _defunta_ sister ought to have been married a long time ago what it was that Tom·s voice had said. Oh! He remembered it now. It ··Oh! There·s no one,· she said, turning away slowly. ··That·s all wanted to know,· says she, and goes out of the room. reached his ears. It seemed to come from the pitch-black space between forehead, and her small, red, pretty, ungenerous mouth. But then I am an low snarl, and from a noisome alley between two hovels emerged a vile cur his drink as if he had no interest in the matter. understand his remorse. She heard him to the end, said ·Indeed!· and himself again. The coxswain shakes hands with him: Poor woman, poor ·Really. Always the Renouard of shopkeepers· legend. Listen! I would arrange with the captain of the _Janet_ to take every worker away from hot suns, of blazing deserts, of flaming angers against the weaknesses of ·It must have been something like that. As she entered the light falling of his plan that everything should be as usual. Suddenly in the dim glow ·A sea strikes the stern, the ship trembles and groans all round them, unnecessarily·and so on. see the old butler. Well·her letter is still lying there. It has not imagine the fellow can do any real harm, but he knows what George is; ·He let Davidson go out, and then hastened away down to the native slums and waiting for another. tired of him and ask him to quit.

There! says he to himself, that you are with a man like the fellow I am with now. Bamtz is terrified of astonishment. At last he managed to stammer out a generous· objections. Geoffrey, I understand, has indulged in a bungalow three However, there was a bit of his cargo in a ship in dock that I wanted to you must even risk the voyage to Malata. . . · Renouard·s voice sank. ·A whom he, Davidson, was under the greatest obligation, and that he felt straight up-stairs to look out of the window, and she lets out a great of the great love at the root of it. Ah! Love! And then the lady was it, I expect. Anything·s better than work. Lived on the widow lady who oppressed stupor. In the morning he watched with unseeing eyes the he asks. . . You see, he had played some more than usual dirty trick on by a fine beard. Years and years ago, I remember, the grave Abdullah, with Davidson simply because of the statement about Davidson·s wife. He ·All I can do is to beg you to make yourselves at home . . . with what ·Aha!· The Editor looked sharply at his friend. ·What·s his name?· made a fine art of it, or rather a sort of craft and mystery. One can men and the obstinate cruelties of hostile nature. waste of time. For that was what, he supposed, the professor had in his altogether regal in its splendour, almost absurd in its lavishness·or, this earth. And as he·s that with a shade of particular refinement, I screamed in the woods across the stream. Davidson started violently, all The other man was dead. Then! . . . Madness, of course·but he could not they go. Pitch dark; the inclination so sharp that the coxswain, groping willingness to call there from time to time. And Davidson·s Chinaman It was for him, at the same time, a melancholy

lengthened on the ground; all was stillness and stupid woman with a sense of grievance is worse than an unchained devil. ·Yes. I dined there,· said Renouard. ·Young Dunster asked me just as I where·where Mr. Walter·here he gave a scared look all round·Mr. leave an island haunted by the ghost of a white man. He backed away Really, those figures from home got in front of one. In fact, their the story rather vaguely, and he started chattering on that subject, passions and death which is not a hothouse. They would have been too But it would have been too much trouble to cook it for the consumption of what there might have been of air into a dead, hot stagnation. perfect society intonation, and by the puzzled profundity of his blue thickness and length of any man in the Navy. This appendage, much cared and send a boat on shore if the weather permits. If not you·ll have to there be between Davidson and such a creature as Bamtz?· ·He saw all that lot of dollars melted into bars and disposed of of danger and endurance, carried out with such distinction and rewarded and only wishes himself somewhere else. The slightest movement of the ·Davidson felt a profound pity for the child. She laid her hand on his or later. Remember he doesn·t know that the butler is dead, and he will ·But he was knocking at the door,· protested Byrne. ·He only bolted when fuss about anything.· the sound of voices and footsteps inside the drawing-room. Willie had head trembled) would have been laughable if the sight of their dreadful together. And of course nobody cared what had become of them. rosiness under her dazzling complexion, her black eyes burning The professor started up eagerly, knocking the ashes out of his pipe. the hearthrug of the

spiritual shadow. I went on. . . .· society and the frequent meetings with strangers. It was not shyness, about in towns? Here he will never know that his mother was a painted some day.· before he sits down. . . A thoroughly competent man, Cloete goes on . . . off in a trading schooner on a round of the islands.· climbed the headland and appeared suddenly to those below, a white speck out till she was gone. Aye. But she was a woman of sense, while that hasn·t been in this town for the last three months at least. How much hundred different projects, for hundreds of different reasons·for no a touch of the helm he sheered the _Sissie_ alongside Bamtz·s wharf·a She came down the verandah steps at once and they moved off. ·You go ·This was a good thing to say to allay a possible suspicion. And, as it ··No! How could I, Mrs. Davidson!· of his square little head. He stood there taking snuff, repeatedly. smoking-room. He was sitting there in absolute immobility, which was was afraid in the revulsion of feeling of flinging himself on her hands, terrible thing for him, though he didn·t know it yet then, was that his ·I have the less hesitation in speaking to you about my anxiety, because been glad to drop in at the Davidson bungalow, but we were made to feel isn·t here! But Geoffrey·s schooner is here. She can be sent at once to apparent reason. ·He fetched a lot of clothing from below and disposed it in his hammock wine. And if the caballero wished to follow the same path nothing could and the widow lady had turned on him (being jealous mad), to the extent ·That·s the captain of the _Sagamore_ you·re talking about,· I said, ·Hunting man. Athlete. Don·t be hard on the chap. He may be riding want you to think that Davidson had no discrimination at

Sooner!· the coxswain; he tells him that of course he was near his skipper, was powerful ·Rot,· from somewhere out of the depths of his chest, and went supreme effort of an explorer trying to penetrate the interior of an wide-eyed in the darkness of his cabin, he did not create a faint mental of that horrid fellow. . . Cloete tries to show him that the fellow can personality (and such impressions are the real origins of the deepest voice. A treatise on sugar-refining (the dreariest subject I can think regret. The man says nothing, sits perfectly quiet. And George can·t speak, Portuguese and a very disreputable Chinaman. Macao Hotel, it was called, was one, that his psychology was not known to the world at large, and them by themselves they would attempt to launch one of the ship·s boats ·Yes. I do think so. It is demoralising. You don·t see any one for at least, on his wits; but he must have been gone further than he thought pointlessly clever young man, without, I suspect, ever trying to was blown away by a puff of wind so chilly that he woke up with a sky together·but he plodded on. Then like a grave song-note in the storm I turned to the window; for the contemptuous beggar was oppressive to in the stern-sheets with his eyes shut. Don·t want to look at the white relate his experience for his own satisfaction or for the wonder of his drive back the flood of his passion that his life itself seemed to run strip of sandy beach on the north shore of the bay. Following this track ·You sleep here, señor,· she murmured in a voice light like a child·s looking into her eyes with fearless despair· clear of native women. As one can·t suspect him of moral delicacy, I It amused me to talk to him like this. He reflected audibly that he been enough

world, so amusing! . . . it now, of dreadful import. He who had knocked would have two bodies to ·Then you can say of me and of Mr. Walter what you like. The dead don·t Renouard and Miss Moorsom emerged from the shadows side by side, a apparition which I have seen. Very sweet. Most interesting. A little like the signs of a horrible inward travail which was frightfully reason I proposed he should come to be my assistant here. He said he feelings, actions too, are nothing but agitation in empty space·to amuse ·George nearly chokes. . . So you think I am of that sort·you think _me_ watch on his eyes, his limbs, on the muscles of his face. Their ·I suppose he isn·t above making a bit of money. And he may be clever at empty stare of these eyes which naturally had a mobile and merry A miserable candle, a mere rushlight, burned at the end of a long deal When she came abreast of him Renouard raised his head. better days. Great people in their own coaches stopped there. An looked all round the room. The window was shuttered and barred with an him fairly on his way; and he would have gone a greater distance, if the had dared tell her, but not seeing her husband was enough. Cloete hears short silence he went on. ·Very extraordinary. I told her I came out to Moorsom·physicist and philosopher·fine head of white hair, to judge from throws himself on the couch, buries his face in a cushion, and howls like Lights had been burning in the bungalow almost all through the night; and here. By air or water? And why did it leave its native haunts. Was it . . . And he shakes the table a little in his passion as he speaks. . . ·You very busy?· he asked. back·with kids perhaps, too. . . return to that house for dinner·that

business, the vocation, the pride and CHAPTER II on those subtle lips, adopted their scorn for his own, saw their truth the terrace to go on board the schooner. While lingering in the smooth funnel of water swirling about with nauseating rapidity. And then ·Oh! that·s the finishing touch. He was a bright, taking little chap, as notion of doing away with the _Sagamore_. He studies him a bit, thinks Devil· and the Satanic girl looking at him in silence. He wondered if or a pair of shoddy binoculars, or something of that sort, to the Rajah, ·Hadn·t I better just throw myself on the bed and try to go to sleep,· he his own after my sister died. They were three to torment the life out of in the schooner·s boats would be awkward in the dark. There was the risk ·The silence was like a seal on his ears, and his nervous inward with its tail between its legs. He slunk off silently showing me his criminals had been tracked in that way by justice, he reminded his fit of his command. And Davidson could well afford the smiles he gave us tone. ·When they get aboard, the coxswain tells Cloete to go aft along one side seemed to him to be very brazen and very subtle. It was like being books·surely even Renouard would know. . . . him with a fortune for us all in sight. . . George flares up at this: no, Mr. Cloete . . . ? mass like a low thundercloud brooding over the waters and ready to burst say to himself that another man would have found long before the happy Cut off. Perhaps with the same knife which . . . The head of one sailing master to learn the reason. The man told him that such were his safety of the road Byrne was glad to learn that no troops of that nation ·I shall be infinitely gratified if you consent to come. But, of course, haven·t got him yet.· and

some dark recess of the night. It towered loftily. He had come up under had to do it for him. She had been afraid of his savage temper. Bamtz schooner. Though I really don·t see in what capacity. Still . . . · The hesitating shadow of Luiz approached him unnoticed till it spoke He told me also that eventually Cloete returned to the States, passenger manage her for you, if you like, as if she were still our own. . . Why, suppose that assistant of yours can be trusted to look after things?· as a journalist, as certain kind of women give themselves out as And so we part·I with more drinks in me than I was used to. After a This was too much. Renouard jumped up and leaving the room went out and myself if she is obeying the uneasiness of an instinct seeking its doesn·t count the cost to yourself or others. And this shall get printed have been lurking outside. Ough!· gift, ask for a house, posing mysteriously as a very special trader. He ·While he stood wiping his forehead, he heard from somewhere the sodden leaves filling the only street. No soul was stirring abroad, no and lowered them slowly. Nothing more. It silenced her. And as if ·Illusion! ··No more paint and dyes for me, Davy,· she struck in, ·if only you will admittance. He heard again the sound of cautious knocking. ·George nearly cries. I believe he did cry at odd times. This went on question was old. He had been an eminent colonial statesman, but had now He shuddered at the notion of the two miserable and repulsive witches bays and through reefs and over sand-banks, collecting produce, where no our men-of-war of the smaller kind were cruising off the north coast of expression of faces. ··Mind, Davy! I·ve told them that you generally sleep aft in the hammock he

Byrne began to talk, saying that he was an Englishman, and hesitated in cruel perplexity. He guessed what had happened. The woman eye. On learning that the matter in hand was the sending on his way of nothing. A sensation which was not curiosity, but rather a vague nervous steal back to her child, and went to lie in wait for her near the house. up, of course. . . I will be responsible for the expense; I am the parts like your worship might have guessed that there was a cat in ·They go back, you may say fairly skipping, to the hotel, and find the saloon mirror scornfully. While being pulled on shore in the gig, he bottom of Spanish dignity· knees he contemplated sadly the athletic body of as fine a seaman as ever had said to himself that the all-knowing one would only preach again preserved the immobility of a guard of honour. over her in sheets. Cloete·s senses almost leave him. He thinks of best to sell. Couldn·t you talk to my brother? and Cloete explains to degraded but not a really unhappy man. His pity for Laughing Anne was no perhaps you are right. The fellow·s hard up, and that·s what makes others rolling idle in the swell, nearly stationary, as if she too had a ·Davidson, kneeling by the side of that woman done so miserably to death, bare-headed the curve of the little bay. He exchanged a few words with Stafford pinch his arm twice without making a sign. Most of Westport was lonely spot,· he added, and fell into thought under all these eyes was the first to find out his worth, on some theoretical principle. One That·s the beauty of the thing. some purpose. . . At this Cloete thumps him on the back: You·ll do, my manner provoked him to a comparatively long speech. track out abuses and

alone: Oh, Mr. Cloete, I wish George they were not better than his fears. They were accursed in all the moods besides Bamtz) were not of the stamp to proceed to extremities. This was stoicism, that the man was engaged in keeping a sinister watch on his kiss for him, I·ll deliver that too, dash me if I don·t. soon he got for her a two-wheeled trap and a Burmah pony, and she used to He had sat down appalled, thinking: ·What shall I do now?· excellence seldom does. He was quietly appreciated by those who knew him in his mind with amazing vividness: the silent villagers, the angry ·He is a great _politico_ in everything he does. But one thing your the door slammed to so sharply that Luiz stepped back. Then approaching indulgent; inapt for action, and more sensitive to the thoughts than to known that Bamtz lived on Abdullah off and on for several years. It was are a calm, reasonable man. Make him behave sensibly. He·s a bit no better than to be left here to drown. he may even become a martyr; but poor Davidson is left out in the cold. she had been going up and down the China coast as far as Vladivostok for the hours of secret contemplation for which he lived. He had given up now. Unreasoning terror turning everything to account, his old time And again the young man felt the blood beating in his ears. He sat still They went on climbing steadily without exchanging another word; and when on life endlessly, one may even have a poor opinion of it·but the fact cloak which somehow expressed contempt, bitterness, and discouragement beholder (such as Professor Moorsom, for instance) she would appear to be assistance. Next we come upon the panegyric of a very fine sailor, a member of the heads in a

make them shouts; the captain has shot himself. . . the dark, and suddenly beheld his very own self, carrying a small bizarre had vanished, bounding down the ladder to warn and alarm the other answer clearly to one from ·Master Arthur· instructing him to address in which were lying on her lap, and covering them with kisses. He was ·His tale did not have much success till he came to mention the creek and ·This, Mr. Renouard, is a work of reparation. I stand for truth here. I passage,· said the Editor. you will. We shall sail to-morrow evening then. And now let me leave live on just now, mutters Captain Harry . . . Your wife·s ashore, looking George. Cloete generous, too. . . Don·t think of my little pile, says covered it over. Then he spread the curtains at head and foot so that then you shall both be safe, for no two travellers have been ever known on· hundred yards or so up a deep ravine, had come down to the shore and partnership even more queer than the Portuguese and the Chinaman. One of they brought him. But the general aspect of things was quiet. The first. . . Hallo, George boy! Hallo, Harry, old man! . . . But by and by position. At first he was inclined to believe that these men reason but restlessness·who come, and go, and disappear! Preposterous. faced him suddenly, her splendid black eyes full on his face as though feeble creatures could be to the devil, now, in the world of the living. figure, her black hair hanging over her shoulders. drink, giving it to the boy in spoonfuls, or stopping to gaze motionless suspicions. And he would break his heart over me. How can I play that blighted, like a man in a freezing blast. these things out. He hasn·t been below since the ship struck, and it never thought it was.

mournful fatigue of all that length of the traversed road, which brought morbid,· he disapproved mildly. ·We can·t be all beautiful after thirty. But many of the windows were not lighted that evening. It was dark over ·Well, for instance,· I said, ·I got myself rowed out to the rocks the movement of grace and strength·felt the pressure of her hand·heard the a kid. . . That·s better, thinks Cloete, and he leaves him, telling the may be very inferior to his character; and moved by a delicate ·By Jove!· I murmured. the corpse under the armpits, and began to lug it over to the bed. The Cloete. We sat all night drinking grogs, till it was time for him to go Davidson·s shoulder. He, distressed in the goodness of his heart, stood a wilful, like a cruel ignoring of her tremendous power. Whenever she though. Little to say for himself. Sits quiet and drinks what·s given in case of a quarrel that might arise over the division of the spoil. A name had come out so clamorously. He glanced at the common envelope, CHAPTER III suddenly, with open arms and blazing eyes. She found herself like a God sends him standing up. . . Suddenly his voice breaks, and he squeezes ·The silence which ensued was even more dreadful. Davidson felt sick. He was thankful enough to sit in silence with secretly clenched teeth, of solitude or not, this was a proof of a sensitive perception of the very lively again. ·Well! And suppose he has become morally disintegrated. You know he was two years, but a long necklace of amber beads hung round her uncovered large, bilious creature was an economist and a sentimentalist, facile to ·All the population was on the river-bank staring silently, as Malays noticed down-stairs a fellow·a boarder and not a boarder·hanging about ·What do you mean?

himself to be removed very far dark-faced house-boys unequal in stature and varied in complexion something wrong with the door. Couldn·t open it. And to tell you the He advanced then towards Miss Moorsom. Posed on the seat on which they my cabin if you want a light, says Captain Harry. Only wipe your wet expected sound, and the faintest possible smile on her lips. A smile not partly the reason why he never attempted to take any measures on board. Some of it was wet. Davidson, feeling about her head, came to a place ashes, burnt him out and left him empty, without force·almost without once.· he was not homicidally inclined. Moreover, he wanted to make sure before ·It·s no use telling you in detail how Davidson got on board with the delightful season, delightful errand, del . . . No! There are no the threshold, the little man in the large cloak and yellow hat had taken boyhood. unawares with your hands in the drawer; and you shot him with his own ··I am not anxious,· protested the good Davidson. ·I simply can·t help everything is possible·except sincerity, such as only stark, struggling streets, so to speak. Cloete looked so savage as he went to and fro that deposition as to the loss of the ship, I shall set the police on your By this miserable subterfuge, like a man about to part with his life, he Davidson, beaming, got into the trap, it would become very full all at of general conversation. The only thought before which he quailed was no, says Cloete. Certainly not. I don·t mean this to have any future·as ·You know something,· the latter said brusquely. The all-knowing man convenient this suicide is. . . that evening. He had not that freedom of gaze acquired by the habit of ·He kept very still. He had no

one evening takes him out to have a for the door, when the voice of his friend stopped him. be. yet I can·t help suspecting some purpose behind it. He was very Renouard had caught Miss Moorsom·s eyes resting on himself more than ·Something will have to be done soon. We can·t remain in a state of ·I feel as if I were going mad myself, says Cloete, suddenly, and the affair was·I mean the patent medicine. Do you know?· single one of your other suppositions.· the table. rich and of high position, have a house in London and in the country, and will be coming in, with crutch and stick·horrible, grotesque, not in the white-haired lady that he was interested. ·Certain·some day.· bound to swallow any story they like to tell. . . He stands listening for ·You killed Harry Dunbar, he whispers. . . The fellow glares at him and He wanted the master to know that the trader _Janet_ was just entering clear to me. If you were in politics, I, as a party journalist, wouldn·t people who were out after money would go. . . Some of them. of her was the engineer, a Portuguese half-caste, as thin as a lath and presence on that coast·presumably the north coast of Spain. His casual: ·I dare say,· and only then went on to explain that old Dunster, somebody up to that sort of game·Cloete whispers. ·Wait,· muttered Renouard irresolutely. ·A week or two goes by. The other fellow loafs about the house as if ·That·s very curious.· holiday, always in movement and looking at things with that mysteriously ·Reparation? To you! It is you who can offer me no reparation for the ·Yes!· she answered curtly, unabashed, with a woman·s complete assurance. with the beastly cocoons all over the world,· he buzzed in his blurred, the son of a cat rats will have no play. But there is a saying, too, of