“They are escaping,” she said.

“No fear of that,” he replied, turning away from her.

“Where are the others?”

“Dead!”

“Do you mean that you killed nearly all those men?”

“Six of them.  There were nine in all.”

He knelt again, lifting the rifle.  Iris threw herself on her knees by his side.  There was something awful to her in this chill and business-like declaration of a fixed purpose.

“Mr. Jenks,” she said, clasping her hands in an agony of entreaty, “do not kill more men for my sake!”

“For my own sake, then,” he growled, annoyed at the interruption, as the sampan was afloat.

“Then I ask you for God’s sake not to take another life.  What you have already done was unavoidable, perhaps right.  This is murder!”

He lowered his weapon and looked at her.

“If those men get away they will bring back a host to avenge their comrades—­and secure you,” he added.

“It may be the will of Providence for such a thing to happen.  Yet I implore you to spare them.”

He placed the rifle on the sand and raised her tenderly, for she had yielded to a paroxysm of tears.  Not another word did either of them speak in that hour.  The large triangular sail of the sampan was now bellying out in the south wind.  A figure stood up in the stern of the boat and shook a menacing arm at the couple on the beach.

It was the Malay chief, cursing them with the rude eloquence of his barbarous tongue.  And Jenks well knew what he was saying.

CHAPTER VIII

PREPARATIONS

They looked long and steadfastly at the retreating boat.  Soon it diminished to a mere speck on the smooth sea.  The even breeze kept its canvas taut, and the sailor knew that no ruse was intended—­the Dyaks were flying from the island in fear and rage.  They would return with a force sufficient to insure the wreaking of their vengeance.

That he would again encounter them at no distant date Jenks had no doubt whatever.  They would land in such numbers as to render any resistance difficult and a prolonged defence impossible.  Would help come first?—­a distracting question to which definite answer could not be given.  The sailor’s brow frowned in deep lines; his brain throbbed now with an anxiety singularly at variance with his cool demeanor during the fight.  He was utterly unconscious that his left arm encircled the shoulder of the girl until she gently disengaged herself and said appealingly—­

“Please, Mr. Jenks, do not be angry with me.  I could not help it.  I could not bear to see you shoot them.”

Then he abruptly awoke to the realities of the moment.

“Come.” he said, his drawn features relaxing into a wonderfully pleasing smile.  “We will return to our castle.  We are safe for the remainder of this day, at any rate.”