ell shake, as if to remind her
divine husband of her promise to show it to Fire and Water, murmured low
to herself as she went, "He is a very great god; a very great god, no
doubt; but I hate him, I hate him! He would eat me to-morrow if I didn't
coax him and wheedle him and keep him in a good temper. You want to be
sharp, indeed, to be the wife of a god. I got off to-day with the skin of
my teeth. He might have turned and killed me. If only I could find out
the Great Taboo, I would tell it to the stranger, the King of the Rain;
and then, perhaps, Tu-Kila-Kila would die. And the stranger would become
Tu-Kila-Kila in turn, and I would be one of his wives; and Toko, who is
his Shadow, would return again to the service of Tu-Kila-Kila's temple."

But Fire, as she passed, was saying to Water, "We are getting tired in
Boupari of Lavita, the son of Sami. If the luck of the island is not to
change, it is high time, I think, we should have a new Tu-Kila-Kila."

CHAPTER XX.

COUNCIL OF WAR.

That same afternoon Muriel had a visitor. M. Jules Peyron, formerly of
the College de France, no longer a mere Polynesian god, but a French
gentleman of the Boulevards in voice and manner, came to pay his
respects, as in duty bound, to Mademoiselle Ellis. M. Peyron had
performed his toilet under trying circumstances, to the best of his
ability. The remnants of his European clothes, much patched and overhung
with squares of native tappa cloth, were hidden as much as possible by a
wide feather cloak, very savage in effect, but more seemly, at any rate,
than the tattered garments in which Felix had first found him in his own
garden parterre. M. Peyron, however, was fully aware of the defects of
his costume, and profoundly apologetic. "It is with ten thousand regrets,
mademoiselle," he said, many times over, bowing low and simpering, "that
I venture to appear in a lady's _salon_--for, after all, wherever a
European lady goes, there her _salon_ follows her--in such a _tenue_
as that in which I am now compelled to present myself. _Mais que
voulez-vous? Nous ne sommes pas a Paris_!" For to M. Peyron, as innocent
in his way as Mali herself, the whole world divided itself into Paris and
the Provinces.

Nevertheless, it was touching to both the new-comers to see the
Frenchman's delight at meeting once more with civilized beings. "Figure
to yourself, mademoiselle," he said, with true French effusion--"figure
to yourself the joy and surpris