After an instant he boldly strode to a stone block back of and to the left of the image.  Seizing it by the top, he gave the impression that he was about to lift the great stone.  Instead, however, he merely slid from its position a thin slab, pushing it half way off of its square base.  Instantly the sound of rushing water filled the ear, and the unaccountable, muffled roar that had puzzled them was half explained.  The block was hollow, revealing a deep, black hole, out of which poured the sound of the hidden stream.  The mystified observers could plainly see the water some ten feet below the surface of the earth, gliding swiftly off through a subterranean passage.  The chief made them understand that this well was for the purpose of supplying the image with drinking water whenever he needed it.

“That’s very interesting,” said Hugh to Tennys.  “I’ll have to see where this water comes from to-morrow.  From a practical point of view it is the finest bit of natural sewerage I ever have seen.  I’ll make arrangements to tap it, if we are to live here.”

“You lawless Americans!”

Apparently satisfied, the chief and his staring companions withdrew, devoutly prostrating themselves not to the graven image, but to the living, breathing beings who were awaiting, with an ungodlike appetite, an opportunity to make way with the tempting fruit.

“It is ridiculous to allow those poor things to fall down like that every time they turn around before us,” she said, when they were alone.

“We must encourage it.  If we are to be idols we can’t afford to give our subjects a bit of relief from their religious obligations, and I’m quite sure we are idols or sovereigns, more than likely the former, judging by the snubbing our flinty friend has received.”

“If we are to live among these people, Hugh Ridgeway, I, for one, intend to tell them, if possible, of the real God, and to do what I can for a cause I served but feebly in the past.  I may be a poor missionary, but I intend to try in my weak way to do some good among these poor, benighted creatures.”

“I think we’d better let well enough alone,” said he disparagingly.

“Why, Hugh, how can you say that?”

“I haven’t thought very much about God since I’ve been in this land.  I’ve been too busy,” he muttered, with no little shame in his face, although he assumed an air of indifference.

“He saved us from the sea,” she said simply, with a tremor in her voice.  “Surely you remember the prayers you uttered from your very soul on that night.  Were they not to God?”

“Begin your missionary work with me, Tennys.  I am worse than the savages,” he said, not in answer to her question.

Silently and greedily they ate of the delicious fruit, and found new sensations in the taste of more than one strange viand of nature.  A calm restfulness settled down upon their tired bodies, and all the world seemed joyfully at peace with them.