“Oh, she has declared her intention,” murmured Lingard, absent-mindedly.

D’Alcacer felt himself completely abandoned by that man.  And within two paces of him he noticed the group of Belarab and his three swarthy attendants in their white robes, preserving an air of serene detachment.  For the first time since the stranding on the coast d’Alcacer’s heart sank within him.  “But perhaps,” he went on, “this Moor may not in the end insist on giving us up to a cruel death, Captain Lingard.”

“He wanted to give you up in the middle of the night, a few hours ago,” said Lingard, without even looking at d’Alcacer who raised his hands a little and let them fall.  Lingard sat down on the breech of a heavy piece mounted on a naval carriage so as to command the lagoon.  He folded his arms on his breast.  D’Alcacer asked, gently: 

“We have been reprieved then?”

“No,” said Lingard.  “It’s I who was reprieved.”

A long silence followed.  Along the whole line of the manned stockade the whisperings had ceased.  The vibrations of the gong had died out, too.  Only the watchers perched in the highest boughs of the big tree made a slight rustle amongst the leaves.

“What are you thinking of, Captain Lingard?” d’Alcacer asked in a low voice.  Lingard did not change his position.

“I am trying to keep it off,” he said in the same tone.

“What?  Trying to keep thought off?”

“Yes.”

“Is this the time for such experiments?” asked d’Alcacer.

“Why not?  It’s my reprieve.  Don’t grudge it to me, Mr. d’Alcacer.”

“Upon my word I don’t.  But isn’t it dangerous?”

“You will have to take your chance.”

D’Alcacer had a moment of internal struggle.  He asked himself whether he should tell Lingard that Mrs. Travers had come to the stockade with some sort of message from Jorgenson.  He had it on the tip of his tongue to advise Lingard to go and see Mrs. Travers and ask her point blank whether she had anything to tell him; but before he could make up his mind the voices of invisible men high up in the tree were heard reporting the thinning of the fog.  This caused a stir to run along the four sides of the stockade.

Lingard felt the draught of air in his face, the motionless mist began to drive over the palisades and, suddenly, the lagoon came into view with a great blinding glitter of its wrinkled surface and the faint sound of its wash rising all along the shore.  A multitude of hands went up to shade the eager eyes, and exclamations of wonder burst out from many men at the sight of a crowd of canoes of various sizes and kinds lying close together with the effect as of an enormous raft, a little way off the side of the Emma.  The excited voices rose higher and higher.  There was no doubt about Tengga’s being on the lagoon.  But what was Jorgenson about?  The Emma lay as if abandoned by her keeper and her crew, while the mob of mixed boats seemed to be meditating an attack.