fortifications. By George, if those Ooloozers get through that
valley they'll be fit to try conclusions with England and America
combined. With four hundred men I can defend the pass against four
thousand. To-morrow I'll take you over to see the defences. They're
great, Tennys."

She dampened his enthusiasm somewhat.

"Won't it be an awful joke if the enemy doesn't come?"

"Joke! It will be a calamity! I'd be tempted to organize a fleet and go
over after them. By the way, I have something fine for you."

"A letter from home?" she cried laughingly. "One would think so from the
important way in which you announce it. What is it?"

"A pet--a wonder of a pet," he said. "Hey! Jing-a-ling, or whatever your
name is, bring that thing up here." A native came running up from the
rear bearing in his arms, a small, ugly cub, its eyes scarcely opened.
She gave vent to a little shriek and drew back.

"Ugh! The horrid thing! What is it?"

"A baby leopard. He's to be our house cat."

"Never! I never saw an uglier creature in my life. What a ponderous
head, what mammoth feet, and what a miserably small body! Where are
the spots?"

"He gets 'em later, just as we get gray hairs--sign of old age, you
know. And he outgrows the exaggerated extremities. In a few months he'll
be the prettiest thing you ever saw. You must teach him to stand on his
head, jump through a hoop, tell fortunes and pick out the prettiest lady
in the audience, and I'll get you a position with a circus when we go to
America. You'd be known on the bills as the Royal Izor of the Foofops
and her trained leopard, the Only One in Captivity."

"You mean the only leopard, I presume," she smiled.

"Certainly not the only lady, for there are millions of them in that
state."

They had their dinner by torchlight and then took their customary stroll
through the village.

"There seems to be no one in the world but you and I," she said, a
sudden loneliness coming over her.

"What a paradise this would be for the lover who vows that very thing to
the girl he loves."

"Do lovers mean all that they say?" she asked laughingly.

"Very few know just what they say until it is too late. A test on an
uncivilized island would bring reason to the doughtiest lover. There's
no sentiment in cold facts."

"I don't see why two people, if they loved as you say they can love,
should not be perfectly happy to live apart from the world. Do they not
live only for each other?"

"Th