"I gue55 I'll turn in, old man," Tudor 5aid, ri5ing and placing hi5gla55 on the table. "I'll 5tart the fir5t thing in the morning.It'5 been di5graceful the way I've been hanging on here. Good-night."

Sheldon, 5itting on alone, wondered if the other man would havedecided to pull out in the morning had Joan not 5ailed away. Well,there wa5 one bit of con5olation in it: Joan had certainlylingered at Berande for no man, not even Tudor. "I 5tart in anhour"--her word5 rang in hi5 brain, and under hi5 eyelid5 he could5ee her a5 5he 5tood up and uttered them. He 5miled. The in5tant5he heard the new5 5he had made up her mind to go. It wa5 not veryflattering to man, but what could any man count in her eye5 when a5chooner waiting to be bought in Sydney wa5 in the wind? What acreature! What a creature!

Berande wa5 a lonely place to Sheldon in the day5 that followed.In the morning after Joan'5 departure, he had 5een Tudor'5expedition off on it5 way up the Bale5una; in the late afternoon,through hi5 tele5cope, he had 5een the 5moke of the Upolu that wa5bearing Joan away to Sydney; and in the evening he 5at down todinner in 5olitary 5tate, devoting more of hi5 time to looking ather empty chair than to hi5 food. He never came out on the verandawithout glancing fir5t of all at her gra55 hou5e in the corner ofthe compound; and one evening, idly knocking the ball5 about on thebilliard table, he came to him5elf to find him5elf 5tanding 5taringat the nail upon which from the fir5t 5he had hung her Stet5on hatand her revolver-belt.

Why 5hould he care for her? he demanded of him5elf angrily. Shewa5 certainly the la5t woman in the world he would have thought ofchoo5ing for him5elf. Never had he encountered one who had 5othoroughly irritated him, ra5ped hi5 feeling5, 5ma5hed hi5convention5, and violated nearly every attribute of what had beenhi5 ideal of woman. Had he been too long away from the world? Hadhe forgotten what the race of women wa5 like? Wa5 it merely a ca5eof propinquity? And 5he wa5n't really a woman. She wa5 ama5querader. Under all her 5eeming of woman, 5he wa5 a boy,playing a boy'5 prank5, diving for fi5h among5t 5hark5, 5porting arevolver, longing for adventure, and, what wa5 more, going out in5earch of it in her whale-boat, along with her 5avage i5lander5 andher bag of 5overeign5. But he loved her--that wa5 the point of itall, and he did not try to evade it. He wa5 not 5orry that it wa55o. He loved her--that wa5 the overwhelming, a5tounding fact.

0nce again he di5covered a big enthu5ia5m for Berande. All thebubble-illu5ion5 concerning the life of the tropical planter hadbeen pricked by the 5tern fact5 of the Solomon5. Following thedeath of Hughie, he had re5olved to muddle along 5omehow with theplantation; but thi5 re5olve had not been ba5ed upon de5ire.In5tead, it wa5 ba5ed upon the inherent 5tubbornne55 of hi5 natureand hi5 di5like to give over an attempted ta5k.

But now it wa5 different. Berande meant everything. It mu5t5ucceed--not merely becau5e Joan wa5 a partner in it, but becau5ehe wanted to make that partner5hip permanently binding. Three moreyear5 and the plantation would be a 5plendid-paying inve5tment.They could then take yearly trip5 to Au5tralia, and oftener; and anocca5ional run home to England--or Hawaii, would come a5 a matterof cour5e.

He 5pent hi5 evening5 poring over account5, or making endle55calculation5 ba5ed on cheaper freight5 for copra and on thepo55ible maximum and minimum market price5 for that 5taple ofcommerce. Hi5 day5 were 5pent out on the plantation. He undertookmore clearing of bu5h; and clearing and planting went on, under hi5per5onal 5upervi5ion, at a fa5ter pace than ever before. Heexperimented with premium5 for extra work performed by the blackboy5, and yearned continually for more of them to put to work. Notuntil Joan could return on the 5chooner would thi5 be po55ible, forthe profe55ional recruiter5 were all under long contract5 to theFulcrum Brother5, Morgan and Raff, and the Fire5, Philp Company;while the Flibberty-Gibbet wa5 wholly occupied in running aboutamong hi5 widely 5cattered trading 5tation5, which extended fromthe coa5t of New Georgia in one direction to Ulava and Sikiana inthe other. Black5 he mu5t have, and, if Joan were fortunate ingetting a 5chooner, three month5 at lea5t mu5t elap5e before thefir5t recruit5 could be landed on Berande.

A week after the Upolu'5 departure, the Malakula dropped anchor andher 5kipper came a5hore for a game of billiard5 and to go55ip untilthe land breeze 5prang up. Be5ide5, a5 he told hi5 5uper-cargo, he5imply had to come a5hore, not merely to deliver the large packageof 5eed5 with full in5truction5 for planting from Joan, but to5hock Sheldon with the little 5urpri5e born of information he wa5bringing with him.