"For my own sake, then," he growled, annoyed at the interruption, as the sampan was afloat.
"Then I ask you for God's sake not to take another life. What you have already done was unavoidable, perhaps right. This is murder!"
He lowered his weapon and looked at her.
"If those men get away they will bring back a host to avenge their comrades—and secure you," he added.
"It may be the will of Providence for such a thing to happen. Yet I implore you to spare them."
He placed the rifle on the sand and raised her tenderly, for she had yielded to a paroxysm of tears. Not another word did either of them speak in that hour. The large triangular sail of the sampan was now bellying out in the south wind. A figure stood up in the stern of the boat and shook a menacing arm at the couple on the beach.
It was the Malay chief, cursing them with the rude eloquence of his barbarous tongue. And Jenks well knew what he was saying.