ble and the camp bedsteads were brought in not
twenty words passed between the members of the party within the net. The
strangeness of their situation made all attempts to exchange ideas very
arduous; and apart from that each had thoughts which it was distinctly
useless to communicate to the others. Mr. Travers had abandoned himself
to his sense of injury. He did not so much brood as rage inwardly in
a dull, dispirited way. The impossibility of asserting himself in any
manner galled his very soul. D'Alcacer was extremely puzzled. Detached
in a sense from the life of men perhaps as much even as Jorgenson
himself, he took yet a reasonable interest in the course of events and
had not lost all his sense of self-preservation. Without being able to
appreciate the exact values of the situation he was not one of those men
who are ever completely in the dark in any given set of circumstances.
Without being humorous he was a good-humoured man. His habitual, gentle
smile was a true expression. More of a European than of a Spaniard he
had that truly aristocratic nature which is inclined to credit every
honest man with something of its own nobility and in its judgment is
altogether independent of class feeling. He believed Lingard to be an
honest man and he never troubled his head to classify him, except in
the sense that he found him an interesting character. He had a sort of
esteem for the outward personality and the bearing of that seaman. He
found in him also the distinction of being nothing of a type. He was a
specimen to be judged only by its own worth. With his natural gift of
insight d'Alcacer told himself that many overseas adventurers of history
were probably less worthy because obviously they must have been less
simple. He didn't, however, impart those thoughts formally to Mrs.
Travers. In fact he avoided discussing Lingard with Mrs. Travers who, he
thought, was quite intelligent enough to appreciate the exact shade of
his attitude. If that shade was fine, Mrs. Travers was fine, too; and
there was no need to discuss the colours of this adventure. Moreover,
she herself seemed to avoid all direct discussion of the Lingard element
in their fate. D'Alcacer was fine enough to be aware that those two
seemed to understand each other in a way that was not obvious even to
themselves. Whenever he saw them together he was always much tempted to
observe them. And he yielded to the temptation. The fact of one's
life depending on the pha