own. Have I not told
you, that you are everybody to me?"

"Ah, yes," she said, slowly, "but I like to hear you say that
again--every day, and every night, whenever I ask; and never to be angry
because I ask. I am afraid of white women who are shameless and have
fierce eyes." She scanned his features close for a moment and added:

"Are they very beautiful? They must be."

"I do not know," he whispered, thoughtfully. "And if I ever did know,
looking at you I have forgotten."

"Forgotten! And for three days and two nights you have forgotten me
also! Why? Why were you angry with me when I spoke at first of Tuan
Abdulla, in the days when we lived beside the brook? You remembered
somebody then. Somebody in the land whence you come. Your tongue is
false. You are white indeed, and your heart is full of deception. I know
it. And yet I cannot help believing you when you talk of your love for
me. But I am afraid!"

He felt flattered and annoyed by her vehemence, and said--

"Well, I am with you now. I did come back. And it was you that went
away."

"When you have helped Abdulla against the Rajah Laut, who is the first
of white men, I shall not be afraid any more," she whispered.

"You must believe what I say when I tell you that there never was
another woman; that there is nothing for me to regret, and nothing but
my enemies to remember."

"Where do you come from?" she said, impulsive and inconsequent, in a
passionate whisper. "What is that land beyond the great sea from which
you come? A land of lies and of evil from which nothing but misfortune
ever comes to us--who are not white. Did you not at first ask me to go
there with you? That is why I went away."

"I shall never ask you again."

"And there is no woman waiting for you there?"

"No!" said Willems, firmly.

She bent over him. Her lips hovered above his face and her long hair
brushed his cheeks.

"You taught me the love of your people which is of the Devil," she
murmured, and bending still lower, she said faintly, "Like this?"

"Yes, like this!" he answered very low, in a voice that trembled
slightly with eagerness; and she pressed suddenly her lips to his while
he closed his eyes in an ecstasy of delight.

There was a long interval of silence. She stroked his head with gentle
touches, and he lay dreamily, perfectly happy but for the annoyance of
an indistinct vision of a well-known figure; a man going away from him
and diminishing in a long perspectiv