As they walked home together, Felix told his companion in a very few words the strange discovery about the Frenchman, and the impenetrable taboo by which he was at present surrounded.  Muriel drew a deep sigh.  “Oh, Felix,” she said—­for they were naturally by this time very much at home with one another, “did you ever know anything so dreadful as the mystery of these taboos?  It seems as if we should never get really to the bottom of them.  Mali’s always springing some new one upon me.  I don’t believe we shall ever be able to leave the island—­we’re so hedged round with taboos.  Even if we were to see a ship to-day, I don’t believe they’d allow us to signal it.”

There was a red sunset; a lurid, tropical, red-and-green sunset.  It boded mischief.

They were passing by some huts at the moment, and over the stockade of one of them a tree was hanging with small yellow fruits, which Felix knew well in Fiji as wholesome and agreeable.  He broke off a small branch as he passed; and offered a couple thoughtlessly to Muriel.  She took them in her fingers, and tasted them gingerly.  “They’re not so bad,” she said, taking another from the bough.  “They’re very much like gooseberries.”

At the same moment, Felix popped one into his own mouth, and swallowed it without thinking.

Almost before they knew what had happened, with the same extraordinary rapidity as in the case of the wedding, the people in the cottages ran out, with every sign of fear and apprehension, and, seizing the branch from Felix’s hands, began upbraiding the two Shadows for their want of attention.

“We couldn’t help it,” Toko exclaimed, with every appearance of guilt and horror on his face.  “They were much too sharp for us.  Their hearts are black.  How could we two interfere?  These gods are so quick!  They had picked and eaten them before we ever saw them.”

One of the men raised his hand with a threatening air—­but against the Shadow, not against the sacred person of Felix.  “He will be ill,” he said, angrily, pointing toward the white man; “and she will, too.  Their hearts are indeed black.  They have sown the seed of the wind.  They have both of them eaten of it.  They will both be ill.  You deserve to die!  And what will come now to our trees and plantations?”

The crowd gathered round them, cursing low and horribly.  The two terrified Europeans slunk off to their huts, unaware of their exact crime, and closely followed by a scowling but despondent mob of natives.  As they crossed their sacred boundary, Muriel cried, with a sudden outburst of tears, “Oh, Felix, what on earth shall we ever do to get rid of this terrible, unendurable godship!”

The natives without set up a great shout of horror.  “See, see! she cries!” they exclaimed, in indescribable panic.  “She has eaten the storm-fruit, and already she cries!  Oh, clouds, restrain yourselves!  Oh, great queen, mercy!  Whatever will become of us and our poor huts and gardens!”