atorial night shone through the
high trees like a new dawn. Hardly a star was visible; even those of the
southern hemisphere pale beside the southern moon.

Maurice Gordon crossed the open space of cultivated garden and plunged
into the black shadow of the forest. His footsteps were inaudible.
Suddenly he ran almost into the arms of a man.

"Who the devil is that?" he cried.

"Meredith," answered a voice.

"Meredith--Jack Meredith, is that you?"

"Yes."

"Well, I'm blowed!" exclaimed Maurice Gordon, shaking hands--"likewise
glad. What brought you out here again?"

"Oh, pleasure!" replied Jack, with his face in the shade.

"Pleasure! you've come to the wrong place for that. However, I'll let
you find out that for yourself. Go on to the bungalow; I'll be back in
less than an hour. You'll find Jocelyn in the verandah."

When Maurice left her, Jocelyn went out into the verandah. It was the
beginning of the hot season. At midday the sun on his journey northward
no longer cast a shadow. Jocelyn could not go out in the daytime at this
period of the year. For fresh air she had to rely upon a long, dreamy
evening in the verandah.

She sat down in her usual chair, while the moonlight, red and glowing,
made a pattern on the floor and on her white dress with the shadows of
the creepers. The sea was very loud that night, rising and falling like
the breath of some huge sleeping creature.

Jocelyn Gordon fell into a reverie. Life was very dull at Loango. There
was too much time for thought and too little to think about. This girl
only had the past, and her past was all comprised in a few months--the
few months still known at Loango as the Simiacine year. She had lapsed
into a bad habit of thinking that her life was over, that the daylight
of it had waned, and that there was nothing left now but the grey
remainder of the evening. She was wondering now why it had all come--why
there had been any daylight at all. Above these thoughts she wondered
why the feeling was still in her heart that Jack Meredith had not gone
out of her life for ever. There was no reason why she should ever meet
him again. He was, so far as she knew, married to Millicent Chyne more
than a year ago, although she had never seen the announcement of the
wedding. He had drifted into Loango and into her life by the merest
accident, and now that the Simiacine Plateau had been finally abandoned
there was no reason why any of the original finders should come t