ot sands heaved amain,
Till we caught our breath from the womb of death
And crept into light again.'"

My eyes were fixed so tensely on the portrait that it grew blurred.
Slowly it seemed to me to vanish and in its place stood a real and
living figure. I could give no detail of its dress or coloring, but it
was a figure of marvelous beauty, and it gazed into my eyes and shook
its head. Then it faded and I was looking again at the portrait. There
was a choke in my throat, and, falling to my knees, I kissed the printed
lips.

CHAPTER XIII

ENTER THE INFANTRYMAN

The morning would bring by rescuers and the breaking up of housekeeping
in my cave. I had no wish that profane eyes should look upon the
portrait or the devout worship of my beloved cannibals. Now that I was
leaving them I realized that they were beloved. In my memory loomed a
hundred acts of simple courtesy. The portrait I took down from its
shrined position; the Damascus daggers I put again into their places,
and the Mandarin's kimono I folded carefully into a package. On all
these things, as on the era for which they stood, I dropped the lid of
the mate's chest.

The morning came on brilliant and fresh with the cleansing sweep of the
trades. Sky and sea sparkled in a diamond clarity, and below me on the
beach patiently waited the dignitaries of my tribe in festal regalia.
Since this was our parting, I too came out decked in the finery of bird
plumage. I did not allow them to climb to the now empty shrine, but led
them down with me to the beach, where shortly a boat came bobbing over
the water.

A queer enough spectacle we must have made, like a flock of blackbirds
patched with the oriole's vermilion and the cockatoo's rose. I myself,
burned out of my Caucasian birthright, differed from them only in my
size.

For a time the handful of white men on the boat hesitated to risk the
chances of landing and being _kai-kai'd_. As they circled at a distance
I made my throat raw, shouting reassurances in English, while my
wondering blacks contemplated with deep awe this talking of the gods.

At last the rescuers rowed in, and I waded out waist deep to meet them.
The officer in command was a colossal Scotchman with a ruddy face and an
honest mouth as stiffly sober as though it had never yielded to the
seduction of a smile. He gave me a detail of two kanakas whose brawny
arms carried down the chest and its contents.

At last came the moment I ha