he creature was so absolutely human and full of fun that it was
difficult to believe it the progeny of these downtrodden, frightened
looking folk. And the strange thing was, it had all the tricks of an
English or American child.

The hiding and peeping business, the ready laugh followed by bashfulness
and self-effacement, the old unalterable impudence, which is not least
amidst the _prima mobilia_ of the childish mind. In another moment, he
felt, the thing would forget its respect and return his grimaces, so he
ignored it and fixed his attention on Meeus and the trembling wretches he
was addressing.

When the lecture was over they were dismissed, and the boy with the
amputated foot was sent off to the forest to find the delinquents and
bring them back. Till sunrise on the following day was the term given
him.

If the others did not begin to return by that time there would be
trouble.

CHAPTER XIV

BEHIND THE MASK

The Silent Pools and the woods around were the haunts of innumerable
birds. Rose-coloured flamingoes and gorgeous ducks, birds arrayed in all
the jewellery of the tropics, birds not much bigger than dragon-flies, and
birds that looked like flying beetles.

When they had dined, Adams, leaving the others to smoke and take their
siesta, went off by the water's edge on a tour of the pools. They were
three in number; sheets of water blue and tranquil and well-named, for
surely in all the world nowhere else could such perfect peace be found.
Perhaps it was the shelter of the forest protecting these windless sheets
of water; perhaps it was the nature of the foliage, so triumphantly alive
yet so motionless; perhaps beyond these some more recondite reason
influenced the mind and stirred the imagination. Who knows? The spirit of
the scene was there. The spirit of deep and unalterable peace. The peace
of shadowy lagoons, the peace of the cedar groves where the sheltering
trees shaded the loveliness of Merope, the peace of the heart which passes
all understanding and which men have named the Peace of God.

It was the first time since leaving Yandjali that Adams had found himself
alone and out of sight of his companions. He breathed deeply, as if
breathing in the air of freedom, and as he strode along, tramping through
the long grass, his mind, whilst losing no detail of the scene around him,
was travelling far away, even to Paris, and beyond.

Suddenly, twenty yards ahead, bounding and beautiful in its