every day. Every day he seemed more distant, and she followed

him patiently, hopefully, blindly, but steadily, through all the
devious wanderings of his mind. She followed as well as she

could. Yet at times--very often lately--she had felt lost like
one strayed in the thickets of tangled undergrowth of a great

forest. To her the ex-clerk of old Hudig appeared as remote, as
brilliant, as terrible, as necessary, as the sun that gives life

to these lands: the sun of unclouded skies that dazzles and
withers; the sun beneficent and wicked--the giver of light,

perfume, and pestilence. She had watched him--watched him close;
fascinated by love, fascinated by danger. He was alone now--but

for her; and she saw--she thought she saw--that he was like a man
afraid of something. Was it possible? He afraid? Of what? Was

it of that old white man who was coming--who had come? Possibly.
She had heard of that man ever since she could remember. The

bravest were afraid of him! And now what was in the mind of this
old, old man who looked so strong? What was he going to do with

the light of her life? Put it out? Take it away? Take it away
for ever!--for ever!--and leave her in darkness:--not in the

stirring, whispering, expectant night in which the hushed world
awaits the return of sunshine; but in the night without end, the

night of the grave, where nothing breathes, nothing moves,
nothing thinks--the last darkness of cold and silence without

hope of another sunrise.
She cried--"Your purpose! You know nothing. I must . . ."

He interrupted--unreasonably excited, as if she had, by her look,
inoculated him with some of her own distress.

"I know enough."
She approached, and stood facing him at arm's length, with both

her hands on his shoulders; and he, surprised by that audacity,
closed and opened his eyes two or three times, aware of some

emotion arising within him, from her words, her tone, her
contact; an emotion unknown, singular, penetrating and sad--at

the close sight of that strange woman, of that being savage and
tender, strong and delicate, fearful and resolute, that had got

entangled so fatally between their two lives--his own and that
other white man's, the abominable scoundrel.

"How can you know?" she went on, in a persuasive tone that seemed
to flow out of her very heart--"how can you know? I live with

him all the days. All the nights. I look at him; I see his
every breath, every glance of his eye, every movement of his

lips. I see nothing else! What else is there? And even I do
not understand. I do not understand him!--Him!--My life! Him

who to me is so great that his presence hides the earth and the
water from my sight!"

Lingard stood straight, with his hands deep in the pockets of his
jacket. His eyes winked quickly, because she spoke very close to

his face. She disturbed him and he had a sense of the efforts he
was making to get hold of her meaning, while all the time he

could not help telling himself that all this was of no use.
She added after a pause--"There has been a time when I could

understand him. When I knew what was in his mind better than he
knew it himself. When I felt him. When I held him. . . . And

now he has escaped."
"Escaped? What? Gone away!" shouted Lingard.

"Escaped from me," she said; "left me alone. Alone. And I am
ever near him. Yet alone."

Her hands slipped slowly off Lingard's shoulders and her arms
fell by her side, listless, discouraged, as if to her--to her,

the savage, violent, and ignorant creature--had been revealed
clearly in that moment the tremendous fact of our isolation, of

the loneliness impenetrable and transparent, elusive and
everlasting; of the indestructible loneliness that surrounds,

envelopes, clothes every human soul from the cradle to the grave,
and, perhaps, beyond.

"Aye! Very well! I understand. His face is turned away from
you," said Lingard. "Now, what do you want?"

"I want . . . I have looked--for help . . . everywhere . . .
against men. . . . All men . . . I do not know. First they

came, the invisible whites, and dealt death from afar . . . then
he came. He came to me who was alone and sad. He came; angry

with his brothers; great amongst his own people; angry with those
I have not seen: with the people where men have no mercy and

women have no shame. He was of them, and great amongst them.
For he was great?"

Lingard shook his head slightly. She frowned at him, and went on
in disordered haste--

"Listen. I saw him. I have lived by the side of brave men . . .
of chiefs. When he came I was the daughter of a beggar--of a

blind man without strength and hope. He spoke to me as if I had
been brighter than the sunshine--more delightful than the cool

water of the brook by which we met--more . . ." Her anxious eyes
saw some shade of expression pass on her listener's face that

made her hold her breath for a second, and then explode into
pained fury so violent that it drove Lingard back a pace, like an

unexpected blast of wind. He lifted both his hands,
incongruously paternal in his venerableaspect, bewildered and

soothing, while she stretched her neck forward and shouted at
him.

"I tell you I was all that to him. I know it! I saw it! . . .
There are times when even you white men speak the truth. I saw

his eyes. I felt his eyes, I tell you! I saw him tremble when I
came near--when I spoke--when I touched him. Look at me! You

have been young. Look at me. Look, Rajah Laut!"
She stared at Lingard with provoking fixity, then, turning her

head quickly, she sent over her shoulder a glance, full of humble
fear, at the house that stood high behind her back--dark, closed,

rickety and silent on its crooked posts.
Lingard's eyes followed her look, and remained gazing expectantly

at the house. After a minute or so he muttered, glancing at her
suspiciously--

"If he has not heard your voice now, then he must be far away--or
dead."

"He is there," she whispered, a little calmed but still
anxious--"he is there. For three days he waited. Waited for you

night and day. And I waited with him. I waited, watching his
face, his eyes, his lips; listening to his words.--To the words I

could not understand.--To the words he spoke in daylight; to the
words he spoke at night in his short sleep. I listened. He

spoke to himself walking up and down here--by the river; by the
bushes. And I followed. I wanted to know--and I could not! He

was tormented by things that made him speak in the words of his
own people. Speak to himself--not to me. Not to me! What was

he saying? What was he going to do? Was he afraid of you?--Of
death? What was in his heart? . . . Fear? . . . Or anger? . .

. what desire? . . . what sadness? He spoke; spoke; many words.
All the time! And I could not know! I wanted to speak to him.

He was deaf to me. I followed him everywhere, watching for some
word I could understand; but his mind was in the land of his

people--away from me. When I touched him he was angry--so!"
She imitated the movement of some one shaking off roughly an

importunate hand, and looked at Lingard with tearful and unsteady
eyes.

After a short interval of laboured panting, as if she had been