The Pools of Silence

Avenue Champs Elysées, and it half veiled the Avenue Malakoff as Adams's fiacre turned into that thor

elf in an enormous courtyard domed in with glass. He noted the orange and aloe trees growing in t

cent as a Lord Mayor's footman, who took the visitor's card and the card of M. Thénard and pres

rchbishop, and had altogether a pontifical air, ra

eur an app

ter on business. You can take him my card-yes,

ine. Only for a moment he hesitated, then leading the way across the warm and flower-scented hall, he opened a door and said, "Will

le-handed Chinese execution swords; old pepper-pot revolvers, such as may still be found on the African coast; knob-kerries, assegais, steel-spiked balls swinging from whips of raw hide; weapons wild and savage and primitive as those with which Attila drove b

n ere the earliest man lifted his face to the chill mystery of the stars. In the right fist was clutched the branch of a M'bina tree, ready lifted to dash your brains out-the whole thing a miracle of the taxidermist's art. Here crawled an alligator on a slab of granitic rock; an alligator-that is to say, the despair of the ta

ptain Berselius was a little man in a frock-coat, rather worn, and slippers. He had evidently been in négligé and, to meet the visitor, slipped into the frock-coat, or possibly he was careless, taken up with abstractions,

o to speak, hung on a hair-trigger; there was always a trace of it o

eeting with Captain Berselius, you would have

n aback by the apparit

opposite the American, crossed his legs in a comfortable manner, caressed his chin, and whilst chatting on general subjects stared full at the newcomer, as though Adams had been a statue

he had to deal with no comm

spacious Adams feel small and of little account in the world. Captain Berselius filled all the space. He was the person in that room; Adams, though he had personality enough, was nowhere. And now he noticed th

tain Berselius, turning suddenly from some

"I have attended his c

the other. "Are

with th

ad to do wi

e shot

re we were camping said there was a big monkey in a tree near by. They seemed very much frightened, but they led me to the tree. He knew what a gun was; he knew what a man was, too. He knew that his hour of death had arrived, and he

d y

I had not even time to raise my gun when he charged. Then I was on my back and he was on top of me. He had overshot the mark a bit-I was not even scratched. I lay looking up at his whiskers; they seemed thick as quills, and I counted them. I was dead to all intents and purposes, so I felt no fear. That was the lesson this gentleman taught m

"I would like a litt

ive you five minutes, as a matter of form. Thénard, in a note to me

hort a time to make my decision about you, I supp

have passed. Why waste the other three? For

a moment, and in that moment h

animal ferocity latent-the ferocity of a tiger-a cold and pitiless and utterly divorced from reason ferociousness, the passion of a primitive man, who had never known law except the law of the axe wielded by the strongest. And yet there was something in the man that he liked. He knew by Berselius'

king up your party?"

putting his watch in his pocket to ind

d it seemed to him that he sa

want," said he. "I am an old campaigner in the wilds, so you will excuse me for specifying them. Go for your outfit where you will, but for your guns to Schaunard, for he is the best. Order all accounts to

ufficient money for my needs, and, if it is the sam

account for drugs and instruments you will please send to M. Pinchon; they are part of the ex

s bo

he way from the room. "It will be within a fortnight. My yacht is lying at Marseilles, and will take us

und himself in a room, half morning room, half boudoir. A bright log fire was burning, and on either

nd-shaped eyes; full lips exquisitely cut in the form of the true cupid's bow; and with a face

her everywhere in the highest social ranks of society. At the Zo?logical Gardens of Madrid on a Sunday, when the grandees of Spain take their pleasur

erselius sat her

t glance at the two w

e's dictum that the highest beauty is unobtainable without something of disproportion was exemplified in the case of Maxine Berselius.

had he done so than a servant, in the blue-and-gold livery of the

ur was that watery green which we associate with the scenery of early spring, the c

, and old almost as the story of Nicolete, it showed ladies listening to shepherds who played on flutes, c

or the food placed before him; he was entirely abs

l manner, his wife and daughter had almost the air of children, nervous, and on their very best behaviour. This was noticeable, especially, in Madame Berselius. The beautiful, indolent, arrogant face became a very humble face indeed when she turned it

was a new type of man to her, and on that account interesting; very different was this son of Anak, with the restful, forceful face, to the curled and scented dandies of the Chaussée d'Antin, the

st beautiful thing he had met in the way of womanhood. She seemed to him a rose only just unfolded, unconscious of its own f

o-night the day and hour of our departure. All my business in Paris will be settled this afternoon. You h