don't know already," he said in
a pleading tone. "Say nothing. Sit still. Time enough to-morrow.
To-morrow! The night is drawing to an end and I care for nothing in the
world but you. Let me be. Give me the rest that is in you."

She had never heard such accents on his lips and she felt for him a
great and tender pity. Why not humour this mood in which he wanted to
preserve the moments that would never come to him again on this earth?
She hesitated in silence. She saw him stir in the darkness as if he
could not make up his mind to sit down on the bench. But suddenly he
scattered the embers with his foot and sank on the ground against her
feet, and she was not startled in the least to feel the weight of his
head on her knee. Mrs. Travers was not startled but she felt profoundly
moved. Why should she torment him with all those questions of freedom
and captivity, of violence and intrigue, of life and death? He was not
in a state to be told anything and it seemed to her that she did not
want to speak, that in the greatness of her compassion she simply could
not speak. All she could do for him was to rest her hand lightly on his
head and respond silently to the slight movement she felt, sigh or sob,
but a movement which suddenly immobilized her in an anxious emotion.

About the same time on the other side of the lagoon Jorgenson, raising
his eyes, noted the stars and said to himself that the night would not
last long now. He wished for daylight. He hoped that Lingard had already
done something. The blaze in Tengga's compound had been re-lighted.
Tom's power was unbounded, practically unbounded. And he was
invulnerable.

Jorgenson let his old eyes wander amongst the gleams and shadows of the
great sheet of water between him and that hostile shore and fancied he
could detect a floating shadow having the characteristic shape of a man
in a small canoe.

"O! Ya! Man!" he hailed. "What do you want?" Other eyes, too, had
detected that shadow. Low murmurs arose on the deck of the Emma. "If you
don't speak at once I shall fire," shouted Jorgenson, fiercely.

"No, white man," returned the floating shape in a solemn drawl. "I am
the bearer of friendly words. A chief's words. I come from Tengga."

"There was a bullet that came on board not a long time ago--also from
Tengga," said Jorgenson.

"That was an accident," protested the voice from the lagoon. "What else
could it be? Is there war between you and Tengga? No, no, O white ma