D’Alcacer stepped back with an almost imperceptible inclination of the head at Lingard, who stood for a moment with twitching face.

“I am an adventurer,” he burst out, “and if I hadn’t been an adventurer, I would have had to starve or work at home for such people as you.  If I weren’t an adventurer, you would be most likely lying dead on this deck with your cut throat gaping at the sky.”

Mr. Travers waved this speech away.  But others also had heard.  Carter listened watchfully and something, some alarming notion seemed to dawn all at once upon the thick little sailing-master, who rushed on his short legs, and tugging at Carter’s sleeve, stammered desperately: 

“What’s he saying?  Who’s he?  What’s up?  Are the natives unfriendly?  My book says—­’Natives friendly all along this coast!’ My book says—­”

Carter, who had glanced over the side, jerked his arm free.

“You go down into the pantry, where you belong, Skipper, and read that bit about the natives over again,” he said to his superior officer, with savage contempt.  “I’ll be hanged if some of them ain’t coming aboard now to eat you—­book and all.  Get out of the way, and let the gentlemen have the first chance of a row.”

Then addressing Lingard, he drawled in his old way: 

“That crazy mate of yours has sent your boat back, with a couple of visitors in her, too.”

Before he apprehended plainly the meaning of these words, Lingard caught sight of two heads rising above the rail, the head of Hassim and the head of Immada.  Then their bodies ascended into view as though these two beings had gradually emerged from the Shallows.  They stood for a moment on the platform looking down on the deck as if about to step into the unknown, then descended and walking aft entered the half-light under the awning shading the luxurious surroundings, the complicated emotions of the, to them, inconceivable existences.

Lingard without waiting a moment cried: 

“What news, O Rajah?”

Hassim’s eyes made the round of the schooner’s decks.  He had left his gun in the boat and advanced empty handed, with a tranquil assurance as if bearing a welcome offering in the faint smile of his lips.  Immada, half hidden behind his shoulder, followed lightly, her elbows pressed close to her side.  The thick fringe of her eyelashes was dropped like a veil; she looked youthful and brooding; she had an aspect of shy resolution.

They stopped within arm’s length of the whites, and for some time nobody said a word.  Then Hassim gave Lingard a significant glance, and uttered rapidly with a slight toss of the head that indicated in a manner the whole of the yacht: 

“I see no guns!”

“N—­no!” said Lingard, looking suddenly confused.  It had occurred to him that for the first time in two years or more he had forgotten, utterly forgotten, these people’s existence.

Immada stood slight and rigid with downcast eyes.  Hassim, at his ease, scrutinized the faces, as if searching for elusive points of similitude or for subtle shades of difference.