I tell you it does' began Kurrell shamelessly.

The sentence was cut by a roar of laughter from Boulte's lips. Kurrell
was silent for an instant, and then he, too, laughed laughed long and
loudly, rocking in his saddle. It was an unpleasant sound the mirthless
mirth of these men on the long white line of the Narkarra Road. There
were no strangers in Kashima, or they might have thought that captivity
within the Dosehri hills had driven half the European population mad.
The laughter ended abruptly, and Kurrell was the first to speak.

'Well, what are you going to do?'

Boulte looked up the road, and at the hills. 'Nothing,' said he quietly;
'what's the use? It's too ghastly for anything. We must let the old life
go on. I can only call you a hound and a liar, and I can't go on calling
you names for ever. Besides which, I don't feel that I'm much better. We
can't get out of this place. What is there to do?'

Kurrell looked round the rat-pit of Kashima and made no reply. The
injured husband took up the wondrous tale.

'Ride on, and speak to Emma if you want to. God knows I don't care what
you do.'

He walked forward, and left Kurrell gazing blankly after him. Kurrell
did not ride on either to see Mrs. Boulte or Mrs. Vansuythen. He sat in
his saddle and thought, while his pony grazed by the roadside.

The whir of approaching wheels roused him. Mrs. Vansuythen was driving
home Mrs. Boulte, white and wan, with a cut on her forehead.

'Stop, please,' said Mrs. Boulte, 'I want to speak to Ted.'

Mrs. Vansuythen obeyed, but as Mrs. Boulte leaned forward, putting her
hand upon the splashboard of the dog-cart, Kurrell spoke.

'I've seen your husband, Mrs. Boulte.'

There was no necessity for any further explanation. The man's eyes were
fixed, not upon Mrs. Boulte, but her companion. Mrs. Boulte saw the
look.

'Speak to him!' she pleaded, turning to the woman at her side. 'Oh,
speak to him! Tell him what you told me just now. Tell him you hate him.
Tell him you hate him!'

She bent forward and wept bitterly, while the sais, impassive, went
forward to hold the horse. Mrs. Vansuythen turned scarlet and dropped
the reins. She wished to be no party to such unholy explanations.

'I've nothing to do with it,' she began coldly; but Mrs. Boulte's sobs
overcame her, and she addressed herself to the man. 'I don't know what
I am to say, Captain Kurrell. I don't know what I can call you. I think
you've you've behaved abominably,