If she had
dared, she would have begged to go on at once to the hospital; but she
did not dare. It was necessary to submit to the delay of being guided
through the prison, to be shown the galleries and the cells, the
Pretoire, and to hear patiently the explanation of the Bertillon system.
At last, however, they were once more in the carriage which had been kept
waiting for them; but even then they must still exercise patience, for a
Disciplinary Camp was on the road along which they must pass, and to
betray too much eagerness to reach their journey's end (when avowedly
they had come to New Caledonia for information) would have been
dangerous. At the camp they must perforce squander twenty or thirty
minutes, Virginia and George pretending to take notes of what they saw
and heard; and then they turned westward. Before them stretched a long
avenue of strangely bent and sloping palms. It was the avenue of the
hospital.

They drove down it to a stone archway, glittering white in the sun, and
saw beyond a green and shaded garden, jewelled with gorgeous flowers, and
heavy with richly mingling scents.

"If Dalahaide is no worse to-day, we shall probably find him in the
garden here," said the Commandant. "He must have read at least half a
dozen times an old copy of Dante which I lent him; the books in the
prison library are not much to his taste."

No one answered, not even Roger. In fact, at the moment Roger was more
anxious, perhaps, than any other member of the party, for he realized the
existence of a certain danger which Virginia and her brother had
apparently lost sight of, although long ago it had been discussed by them
all. It had also been provided against; but the suggestion that Maxime
Dalahaide might be met here in the garden, the thought that at any moment
they might come upon him suddenly and unexpectedly, upset these prudent
calculations.

As Maxime and Roger had known each other five years ago, it had been
decided that a meeting must be avoided at first, lest in his surprise at
seeing a familiar face--like a ghost from another world--the prisoner
should cry out, and involuntarily put those who watched upon their guard.
The three had planned among themselves, when this day was still in the
future, that if they should succeed in their first step, and gain access
to Maxime Dalahaide, Roger must keep in the background until his mind had
been prepared by Virginia and George Trent for what was to come. The
other t