smash down that barrier in Tempest before the hardening process had gone so deep that the man below was stultified. Whether he was competent to break it down did not occur to him. He meant to do it, and these things are not done by the men who doubt their own powers. Of Andree he was not thinking yet. He did not desire to think of her, nor of the use to which that paper might have to be put. But neither did he intend to give it up to Tempest. His determination there was quickened by that jealousy for Tempest's honour which possessed him more and more as he realised how far his own stood from it. Besides, with him as with many of us, the knowledge that there are some people walking their straight way in the world seems to accord to the rest the licence to do that evil which is a necessary part of the earth's make-up.
Dick wheeled at last and went back to the tent. He lit a match and stared at the sleeping Ducane until it burnt his fingers and went out. Then he flung himself down on his own pile of bedding and lay still. Until now he had accepted the fact that Ducane was alive and might outlive him. He had accepted it as mankind usually accepts the obvious things, and he had expended himself in trying to find a way round the edge of the obstruction. Now, with a shock of realisation, it had come to him this night that Ducane's life might not be worth much after all. He was a prematurely aged man; enfeebled by excesses; weakened by living in a way which few white men can stand for long, and with no stamina of brain or spirit to help him in a crisis. Lying there, the longing for this man's death swept over Dick like a torrent of fire; blotting out all but the remembrance that there was a hard journey yet before them, and that no law of men nor angels could make it necessary for him to smooth the trail before Ducane's feet. And if Ducane stumbled and fell and one day did not get up again, then, and only then, would Dick bring his thanksgiving to whichever altar pleased him best, and say, "Allah is good."
In the cold, pale dawn he was up and away down the beach to a little jutting bluff behind which he could read that paper of Robison's in safety. The empty canoes beached on the naked shore; the two little white tents sit-
