life he had to give up, and with a sort of despairing self-
possession he tried to understand the cause of the defeat. He did
not ascribe it to that absurd dead man.

The hesitating shadow of Luiz approached him unnoticed till it
spoke timidly. Renouard started.

"Eh? What? Dinner waiting? You must say I beg to be excused. I
can't come. But I shall see them to-morrow morning, at the landing
place. Take your orders from the professor as to the sailing of
the schooner. Go now."

Luiz, dumbfounded, retreated into the darkness. Renouard did not
move, but hours afterwards, like the bitter fruit of his
immobility, the words: "I had nothing to offer to her vanity,"
came from his lips in the silence of the island. And it was then
only that he stirred, only to wear the night out in restless
tramping up and down the various paths of the plantation. Luiz,
whose sleep was made light by the consciousness of some impending
change, heard footsteps passing by his hut, the firm tread of the
master; and turning on his mats emitted a faint Tse! Tse! Tse! of
deep concern.

Lights had been burning in the bungalow almost all through the
night; and with the first sign of day began the bustle of
departure. House boys walked processionally carrying suit-cases
and dressing-bags down to the schooner's boat, which came to the
landing place at the bottom of the garden. Just as the rising sun
threw its golden nimbus around the purple shape of the headland,
the Planter of Malata was perceived pacing bare-headed the curve of