to budge away from his side, but stood staring fixedly
at the steps, as if they had been something unique and impracticable. He
waited a little, but she did not move.

"Don't you want to go in?" he asked, without turning his head to look at
her. "The sun's too heavy to stand about here." He tried to overcome
a sort of fear, a sort of impatient faintness, and his voice sounded
rough. "You had better go in," he concluded.

They both moved then, but at the foot of the stairs Heyst stopped, while
the girl went on rapidly, as if nothing could stop her now. She crossed
the veranda swiftly, and entered the twilight of the big central room
opening upon it, and then the deeper twilight of the room beyond. She
stood still in the dusk, in which her dazzled eyes could scarcely make
out the forms of objects, and sighed a sigh of relief. The impression
of the sunlight, of sea and sky, remained with her like a memory of a
painful trial gone through--done with at last!

Meanwhile Heyst had walked back slowly towards the jetty; but he did not
get so far as that. The practical and automatic Wang had got hold of
one of the little trucks that had been used for running baskets of coal
alongside ships. He appeared pushing it before him, loaded lightly with
Heyst's bag and the bundle of the girl's belongings, wrapped in Mrs.
Schomberg's shawl. Heyst turned about and walked by the side of the
rusty rails on which the truck ran. Opposite the house Wang stopped,
lifted the bag to his shoulder, balanced it carefully, and then took the
bundle in his hand.

"Leave those things on the table in the big room--understand?"

"Me savee," grunted Wang, moving off.

Heyst watched the Chinaman disappear from the veranda. It was not till
he had seen Wang come out that he himself entered the twilight of the
big room. By that time Wang was out of sight at the back of the house,
but by no means out of hearing. The Chinaman could hear the voice of
him who, when there were many people there, was generally referred to
as "Number One." Wang was not able to understand the words, but the tone
interested him.

"Where are you?" cried Number One.

Then Wang heard, much more faint, a voice he had never heard before--a
novel impression which he acknowledged by cocking his head slightly to
one side.

"I am here--out of the sun."

The new voice sounded remote and uncertain. Wang heard nothing more,
though he waited for some time, very still, the top of his shav