“You ask!” she exclaimed.  He made no sign.  He seemed at a loss for words.

“You ask . . .  Ah!” she cried.  “Don’t you see that I have no kingdoms to conquer?”

III

A slight change of expression which passed away almost directly showed that Lingard heard the passionate cry wrung from her by the distress of her mind.  He made no sign.  She perceived clearly the extreme difficulty of her position.  The situation was dangerous; not so much the facts of it as the feeling of it.  At times it appeared no more actual than a tradition; and she thought of herself as of some woman in a ballad, who has to beg for the lives of innocent captives.  To save the lives of Mr. Travers and Mr. d’Alcacer was more than a duty.  It was a necessity, it was an imperative need, it was an irresistible mission.  Yet she had to reflect upon the horrors of a cruel and obscure death before she could feel for them the pity they deserved.  It was when she looked at Lingard that her heart was wrung by an extremity of compassion.  The others were pitiful, but he, the victim of his own extravagant impulses, appeared tragic, fascinating, and culpable.  Lingard lifted his head.  Whispers were heard at the door and Hassim followed by Immada entered the cabin.

Mrs. Travers looked at Lingard, because of all the faces in the cabin his was the only one that was intelligible to her.  Hassim began to speak at once, and when he ceased Immada’s deep sigh was heard in the sudden silence.  Then Lingard looked at Mrs. Travers and said: 

“The gentlemen are alive.  Rajah Hassim here has seen them less than two hours ago, and so has the girl.  They are alive and unharmed, so far.  And now. . . .”

He paused.  Mrs. Travers, leaning on her elbow, shaded her eyes under the glint of suspended thunderbolts.

“You must hate us,” she murmured.

“Hate you,” he repeated with, as she fancied, a tinge of disdain in his tone.  “No.  I hate myself.”

“Why yourself?” she asked, very low.

“For not knowing my mind,” he answered.  “For not knowing my mind.  For not knowing what it is that’s got hold of me since—­since this morning.  I was angry then. . . .  Nothing but very angry. . . .”

“And now?” she murmured.

“I am . . . unhappy,” he said.  After a moment of silence which gave to Mrs. Travers the time to wonder how it was that this man had succeeded in penetrating into the very depths of her compassion, he hit the table such a blow that all the heavy muskets seemed to jump a little.

Mrs. Travers heard Hassim pronounce a few words earnestly, and a moan of distress from Immada.

“I believed in you before you . . . before you gave me your confidence,” she began.  “You could see that.  Could you not?”

He looked at her fixedly.  “You are not the first that believed in me,” he said.