ught up the long bulk, and springing to his
feet, swung it aloft. Firelight showed the bristling moustache of
Kempner, his long, thin arms poising a great bamboo case bound with
rings of leather or metal. He threw it out with his utmost force,
staggered as though to follow it; then, leaping back, straightened his
tall body with a jerk, flung out one arm in a gesture of surprise, no
sooner rigid than drooping; and even while he seemed inflated for
another of his speeches, turned half-round and dove into the garden and
the night. By the ending of it, he had redeemed a somewhat rancid life.

Before, the angle was alive with swarming heads. As he fell, it was
empty, and the assault finished; for below, the bamboo tube burst with a
sound that shook the wall; liquid flame, the Greek fire of stink-pot
chemicals, squirted in jets that revealed a crowd torn asunder, saffron
faces contorted in shouting, and men who leapt away with clothes afire
and powder-horns bursting at their sides. Dim figures scampered off, up
the rising ground.

"That's over," panted Heywood. "Thundering good lesson,--Here, count
noses. Rudie? Right-oh. Sturgeon, Teppich, Padre, Captain? Good! but
look sharp, while I go inspect." He whispered to Rudolph. "Come down,
won't you, and help me with--you know."

At the foot of the ladder, they met a man in white, with a white face in
what might be the dawn, or the pallor of the late-risen moon.

"Is Hackh there?" He hailed them in a dry voice, and cleared his throat,
"Where is she? Where's my wife?"

It was here, accordingly, while Heywood stooped over a tumbled object on
the ground, that Rudolph told her husband what Bertha Forrester had
chosen. The words came harder than before, but at last he got rid of
them. His questioner stood very still. It was like telling the news of
an absent ghost to another present.

"This town was never a place," said Gilly, with all his former
steadiness,--"never a place to bring a woman. And--and of her age."

All three men listened to the conflict of gongs and crackers, and to the
shouting, now muffled and distant behind the knoll. All three, as it
seemed to Rudolph, had consented to ignore something vile.

"That's all I wanted to know," said the older man, slowly. "I must get
back to my post. You didn't say, but--She made no attempt to come here?
Well, that's--that's lucky. I'll go back."

For some time again they stood as though listening, till Heywood
spoke:--

"Hol