come to him a half glimmer of hope. The other man was dead. Then!
. . . Madness, of course--but he could not give it up. He had
listened to that confounded busybody arranging everything--while
all these people stood around assenting, under the spell of that
dead romance. He had listened scornful and silent. The glimmers
of hope, of opportunity, passed before his eyes. He had only to
sit still and say nothing. That and no more. And what was truth
to him in the face of that great passion which had flung him
prostrate in spirit at her adored feet!

And now it was done! Fatality had willed it! With the eyes of a
mortal struck by the maddening thunderbolt of the gods, Renouard
looked up to the sky, an immense black pall dusted over with gold,
on which great shudders seemed to pass from the breath of life
affirming its sway.



CHAPTER VIII



At last, one morning, in a clear spot of a glassy horizon charged
with heraldic masses of black vapours, the island grew out from the
sea, showing here and there its naked members of basaltic rock
through the rents of heavy foliage. Later, in the great spilling
of all the riches of sunset, Malata stood out green and rosy before
turning into a violet shadow in the autumnal light of the expiring
day. Then came the night. In the faint airs the schooner crept on
past a sturdy squat headland, and it was pitch dark when her