e was glad, for she could not so ardently
have enjoyed playing her role if Sarle had looked on too much with his
innocent, yet keen gaze. It was by accident that he found her alone that
night, between dinner and dancing, and they stayed looking at the stars
and talking of the land they were to reach sometime within the next two
days. He was not a great talker, and most of the information April
gathered was in the form of half-scornful, half-wistful remarks. He
spoke of Africa as a man might speak of some worthless woman, whom he yet
loved above all peerless women. Of the lure and bane of her. How she
was the home of lies and flies, the grave of reputation, the refuge of
the remittance man and the bad egg; the land of the unexpected pest, but
never the unexpected blessing; of sunstroke and fever; scandals and
broken careers; snobbery, bobbery, and highway robbery. How, yet, when
one had been away from her for a little while, sometimes for a few months
only, one forgot all these things and remembered only with hunger and
aching the pink-tipped hills of her, the crystal air, royal sunsets and
tender dawns; the unforgettable friends she had given, the exquisite
reveries her wild spaces had inspired; the valiant men who lie buried in
her breast, the sweeping rivers and leagues and leagues of whispering
grasses. How, suddenly, the nostalgia for the burn and the bite of her
bitter lips seizes upon the men who have known her too long and too well,
dragging them from ease and comfort and the soft cushions of life, back
across the seas to her gaunt and arid breast.

"And there seems to be some kind of blessing in that old Cross held over
us as we come trailing back!"

His smile was scoffing and a little weary, but behind it April heard
longing in his voice, and saw the searching of his eyes towards where
land would soon appear. And what he was feeling strangely communicated
itself to her. The subtle hand of Africa was laid upon her heart, and
she trembled. In that moment she sickened suddenly of her false
position. Why was she not coming to this watchful land frankly and with
clean hands, instead of in the coils of a foolish pretence? She looked
at the fine, open face of the man at her side and was ashamed. An
impulse seized her to tell him the truth, but the thought of Diana drew
her up sharply. Had she the right to disclose the secret before first
consulting the other girl, or at least telling her what she meant t