rating link on link. The soft, sweet wind
blew outward from the cocoanut trees, from the scented earth of the
island. The third passenger watched the junk disappear in the shadows
of the warm night, then he went below to get another drink.

PRISONERS

VI

PRISONERS

Mercier was writing his report for the day. He sat at a rattan table,
covered with a disorderly array of papers, ledgers and note books of
various sorts, and from time to time made calculations on the back of
an old envelope. He finally finished his work, and pushing back his
chair, lighted a cigarette. Unconsciously, he measured time by
cigarettes. One cigarette, and he would begin work. One cigarette and
he would start on the first paragraph. One cigarette, to rest after
the first paragraph before beginning the second, and so on. It was
early in the morning, but not early for a morning in the Tropics.
Already the sun was creeping over the edge of the deep, palm-shaded
verandah, making its way slowly across the wooden floor, till it would
reach him, at his table, in a very short time. And as it slowly crept
along, a brilliant line of light, so the heat increased, the moist,
stagnant heat, from which there was no escape. Outside some one was
pulling the punkah rope, and the great leaves of linen, attached to
heavy teak poles, swayed back and forth over his head, stirring
slightly the dense, humid atmosphere.

Mercier was a young man, not over thirty. He had come out to the East
three years ago, to a minor official post in the Penal Settlement,
glad of a soft position, of easy work, of an opportunity to see life
in the Tropics. At a port on the mainland, he transshipped from the
liner to a little steamer, which two days later dropped anchor in the
blue bay of his future home. At that time, he was conscious of being
intensely pleased at the picture spread before him. Long ago, in
boyhood, he had cherished romantic dreams of the Tropics, of islands
in southern seas, of unknown, mysterious life set in gorgeous, remote
setting. It had all appealed to his fancy, and then suddenly, after
many long years, sordid, difficult years, the opportunity had come for
the realisation of his dreams. He had obtained a post as minor
official in one of the colonies of his country--overseas in the Far
East--and he gladly gave up his dull, routine life at home, and came
out to the adventures that awaited him. The island, as he saw it for
the first time, was bea