?"

"There is no vessel going home."

"Really, doctor?"

"Ah! my dear friend," replied the excellent man boldly, "do you think I
could deceive you?"

Evidently Daniel thought him quite capable of doing so; but he took
good care not to show his suspicions, reserving to himself the right of
making direct inquiries as soon as the opportunity should offer. It came
the very next morning. Two friends of his called to see him. He sent
Lefloch out of the room on some pretext, and then begged them to go down
to the port, and to engage a passage for him,--no, not for him, but for
his man, whom urgent business recalled to France.

In the most eager manner the two gentlemen disappeared. They stayed away
three hours; and, when they came back, their answer was the same as the
doctor's. They declared they had made inquiries on all sides; but they
were quite sure that there was not a single vessel in Saigon ready to
sail for home. Ten other persons whom Daniel asked to do the same
thing brought him the same answer. And yet, that very week, two ships
sailed,--one for Havre, the other for Bordeaux. But the concierge of
the hospital, and Lefloch, were so well drilled, that no visitor reached
Daniel before having learned his lesson thoroughly.

Thus they succeeded in keeping Daniel quiet for a fortnight; but, at the
end of that time, he declared that he felt quite well enough to look out
for a ship himself; and that, if he could do no better, he meant to
sail for Singapore, where he would be sure to procure a passage home. It
would, of course, have been simple folly to try and keep a man back who
was so much bent upon his purpose; and, as his first visit to the port
would have revealed to him the true state of things, the old surgeon
preferred to make a clean breast of it. When he learned that he had
missed two ships, Daniel was at first naturally very much incensed.

"That was not right, doctor, to treat me thus," he exclaimed. "It was
wrong; for you know what sacred duties call me home."

But the surgeon was prepared for his justification. He replied with a
certain solemnity which he rarely assumed,--

"I have only obeyed my conscience. If I had let you set sail in the
condition in which you were, I should have virtually sent you to your
grave, and thus have deprived your betrothed, Miss Ville-Handry, of her
last and only chance of salvation."

Daniel shook his head sadly, and said,--

"But if I get there too late, too late;