“A danger threatens you, beautiful white woman, a great danger threatens you from which I alone can save you, yea! and will in spite of all the gods!”

“You will save me—­you—­and why?”

“Because I love you!”

The words were out, and Leonie, springing to her feet, drew back as the man rose and stood motionless in the dancing shadows thrown by the fire.

“What do you mean?  Oh, how dare you——­”

“How dare I—­dare I—­tell you that I love you and want you for wife?  Why should I not love you from your beautiful head to your perfect feet?  Why should you not be my wife?  Because I am what you call black? because of this colouring of my skin which, outside my own land, damns me to eternity, and bars me from all that I desire?  Nay, you shall listen, and you shall answer!  You will, will you not?”

The voice had dropped from the pitch of fierce denunciation to the sound as of a deep river flowing in pleasant places, and Leonie nodded mutely, succumbing, as is the way of woman, to the entrancing pastime of playing with fire.

She closed her eyes and clasped her hands tightly together when the man, stepping across the barriers of interracial convention, came and stood just behind her shoulder without touching her withal, and spoke in his own tongue.

“Ah, woman, I would call thee wife.  Behold, I have much to offer:  a great name, vast wealth, palaces, broad lands, jewels, elephants, villages; the esteem of my people, the love of my father and of my mother, of whom I am the only son.  All of which is nothing, nothing compared with my love for thee.  A love as virgin as the snow upon the Everlasting Hills, swifter than Mother Ganges, deeper than the Indian Ocean, and higher than the vault of heaven.  What matter custom, or law, or regulation, or colour, when such a love as mine is offered?  Thou as my wife, thou, and thy children my only children.  Am I not beautiful? even as beautiful a male as thou art a female?  Would not the days and the nights, the months and the years be as heaven—­together? Love me—­nay! say but that I may call thee wife.  Give me thy promise and I will save thee!”

“Save me?—­from what?”

Leonie turned and faced this splendid lover, shivering slightly as a low moaning wind rustled the leaves of the trees and stirred the undergrowth.

“Even from death!”

“Death?” she said quietly, looking straight into the man’s eyes. “Death—­for me?  Why I thought I was being willed to the temple to make sacrifice to your god?”

“To-night thou must surely die unless I save thee.”

“Oh! you are mistaken,” came the quick, decisive reply.  “Why, if I was murdered, the whole Empire would be up in arms.”

“The British Raj would not know,” was the quiet answer.

“Oh! but——­”