e from his face.

"Nearly two months ago," he repeated.

"But you will go?" she said--and something in her voice startled him.

"Of course I will go," he replied. He looked down into her face with
a vague question in his quiet eyes; and who knows what he saw there?
Perhaps she was off her guard. Perhaps she read this man aright and did
not care.

With a certain slow hesitation he laid his hand on her arm. There was
something almost paternal in his manner which was in keeping with his
stature.

"Moreover," he went on, "I will get there in time. I have an immense
respect for Meredith. If he said that he could hold out for four months,
I should say that he could hold out for six. There is no one like
Meredith, once he makes up his mind to take things seriously."

It was not very well done, and she probably saw through it. She probably
knew that he was as anxious as she was herself. But his very presence
was full of comfort. It somehow brought a change to the moral
atmosphere--a sense of purposeful direct simplicity which was new to the
West African Coast.

"I will send over to the factory for Maurice," said the girl. "He has
been hard at work getting together your men. If your telegram had not
come he was going up to the Plateau himself."

Oscard looked slightly surprised. That did not sound like Maurice
Gordon.

"I believe you are almost capable of going yourself," said the big man
with a slow smile.

"If I had been a man I should have been half-way there by this time."

"Where is Durnovo?" he asked suddenly.

"I believe he is in Loango. He has not been to this house for more
than a fortnight; but Maurice has heard that he is still somewhere in
Loango."

Jocelyn paused. There was an expression on Guy Oscard's face which she
rather liked, while it alarmed her.

"It is not likely," she went on, "that he will come here. I--I rather
lost my temper with him, and said things which I imagine hurt his
feelings."

Oscard nodded gravely.

"I'm rather afraid of doing that myself," he said; "only it will not be
his feelings."

"I do not think," she replied, "that it would be at all expedient to
say or do anything at present. He must go with you to the Plateau.
Afterwards--perhaps."

Oscard laughed quietly.

"Ah," he said, "that sounds like one of Meredith's propositions. But he
does not mean it any more than you do."

"I do mean it," replied Jocelyn quietly. There is no hatred so complete,
so merciless, a