know the type—­a mere shapeless dug-out.  Hastily I loaded it with food—­yam, taro, bread-fruit—­I pushed it off into the sea—­I embarked alone—­I intrusted myself and all my fortunes to the Bon Dieu and the wide Pacific.  The Bon Dieu did not wholly justify my confidence.  It is a way he has—­that inscrutable one.  Six weeks I floated hither and thither before varying winds.  At last one evening I reached this island.  I floated ashore.  And, enfin, me voila!”

“Then you were a political prisoner only?” Felix said, politely.

M. Jules Peyron drew himself up with much dignity in his tattered costume.  “Do I look like a card-sharper, monsieur?” he asked simply, with offended honor.

Felix hastened to reassure him of his perfect confidence.  “On the contrary, monsieur,” he said, “the moment I heard you were a convict from New Caledonia, I felt certain in my heart you could be nothing less than one of those unfortunate and ill-treated Communards.”

“Monsieur,” the Frenchman said, seizing his hand a second time, “I perceive that I have to do with a man of honor and a man of feeling.  Well, I landed on this island, and they made me a god.  From that day to this I have been anxious only to shuffle off my unwelcome divinity, and return as a mere man to the shores of Europe.  Better be a valet in Paris, say I, than a deity of the best in Polynesia.  It is a monotonous existence here—­no society, no life—­and the cuisine—­bah, execrable!  But till the other day, when your steamer passed, I have scarcely even sighted a European ship.  A boat came here once, worse luck, to put off two girls (who didn’t belong to Boupari), returned indentured laborers from Queensland; but, unhappily, it was during my taboo—­the Month of Birds, as my jailers call it—­and though I tried to go down to it or to make signals of distress, the natives stood round my hut with their spears in line, and prevented me by main force from signalling to them or communicating with them.  Even the other day, I never heard of your arrival till a fortnight had elapsed, for I had been sick with fever, the fever of the country, and as soon as my Shadow told me of your advent it was my taboo again, and I was obliged to defer for myself the honor of calling upon my new acquaintances.  I am a god, of course, and can do what I like; but while my taboo is on, ma foi, monsieur, I can hardly call my life my own, I assure you.”

“But your taboo is up to-day,” Felix said, “so my Shadow tells me.”

“Your Shadow is a well-informed young man,” M. Peyron answered, with easy French sprightliness.  “As for my donkey of a valet, he never by any chance knows or tells me anything.  I had just sent him out—­the pig—­to learn, if possible, your nationality and name, and what hours you preferred, as I proposed later in the day to pay my respects to mademoiselle, your friend, if she would deign to receive me.”

“Miss Ellis would be charmed, I’m sure,” Felix replied, smiling in spite of himself at so much Parisian courtliness under so ragged an exterior.  “It is a great pleasure to us to find we are not really alone on this barbarous island.  But you were going to explain to me, I believe, the exact nature of this peril in which we both stand—­the precise distinction between Korong and Tula?”