time afterwards.

By then he was taking an indulgent view of both the parties to that
amazing transaction. First of all, on reflection, he was by no means
certain that it prevented Heyst from being a perfect gentleman, as
before. He confronted our open grins or quiet smiles with a serious
round face. Heyst had taken the girl away to Samburan; and that was
no joking matter. The loneliness, the ruins of the spot, had impressed
Davidson's simple soul. They were incompatible with the frivolous
comments of people who had not seen it. That black jetty, sticking out
of the jungle into the empty sea; these roof-ridges of deserted houses
peeping dismally above the long grass! Ough! The gigantic and funeral
blackboard sign of the Tropical Belt Coal Company, still emerging from a
wild growth of bushes like an inscription stuck above a grave figured by
the tall heap of unsold coal at the shore end of the wharf, added to the
general desolation.

Thus the sensitive Davidson. The girl must have been miserable indeed to
follow such a strange man to such a spot. Heyst had, no doubt, told
her the truth. He was a gentleman. But no words could do justice to
the conditions of life on Samburan. A desert island was nothing to it.
Moreover, when you were cast away on a desert island--why, you could not
help yourself; but to expect a fiddle-playing girl out of an ambulant
ladies' orchestra to remain content there for a day, for one single day,
was inconceivable. She would be frightened at the first sight of it. She
would scream.

The capacity for sympathy in these stout, placid men! Davidson was
stirred to the depths; and it was easy to see that it was about Heyst
that he was concerned. We asked him if he had passed that way lately.