y, may I ask?" he continued with
austere politeness.

Morrison was abashed.

"Forgive me, Heyst. You must have been sent by God in answer to my
prayer. But I have been nearly off my chump for three days with worry;
and it suddenly struck me: 'What if it's the Devil who has sent him?'"

"I have no connection with the supernatural," said Heyst graciously,
moving on. "Nobody has sent me. I just happened along."

"I know better," contradicted Morrison. "I may be unworthy, but I have
been heard. I know it. I feel it. For why should you offer--"

Heyst inclined his head, as from respect for a conviction in which he
could not share. But he stuck to his point by muttering that in the
presence of an odious fact like this, it was natural--

Later in the day, the fine paid, and the two of them on board the brig,
from which the guard had been removed, Morrison who, besides, being a
gentleman was also an honest fellow began to talk about repayment. He
knew very well his inability to lay by any sum of money. It was partly
the fault of circumstances and partly of his temperament; and it would
have been very difficult to apportion the responsibility between the
two. Even Morrison himself could not say, while confessing to the fact.
With a worried air he ascribed it to fatality:

"I don't know how it is that I've never been able to save. It's some
sort of curse. There's always a bill or two to meet."

He plunged his hand into his pocket for the famous notebook so well
known in the islands, the fetish of his hopes, and fluttered the pages
feverishly.

"And yet--look," he went on. "There it is--more than five thousand
dollars owing. Surely that's something."

He ceased suddenly. Heyst, who had been all the time trying to look
as unconcerned as he could, made reassuring noises in his throat.
But Morrison was not only honest. He was honourable, too; and on this
stressful day, before this amazing emissary of Providence and in the
revulsion of his feelings, he made his great renunciation. He cast off
the abiding illusion of his existence.

"No. No. They are not good. I'll never be able to squeeze them. Never.
I've been saying for years I would, but I give it up. I never really
believed I could. Don't reckon on that, Heyst. I have robbed you."

Poor Morrison actually laid his head on the cabin table, and remained
in that crushed attitude while Heyst talked to him soothingly with the
utmost courtesy. The Swede was as much distress