Hillary looked steadily into the girl’s face. He could not express his thoughts, tell her that he would wish to stay with her always. What would she do were he to spring towards her, clutch her tenderly, fold her in his arms, rain impassioned kisses on her lips, look into her eyes and behave in general like an escaped lunatic? She might think he was mad!—race from him, screaming with fright, seeking her father’s assistance, or even hasten for the native police. Such were the thoughts that flashed through Hillary’s mind. And so, although he longed to do all these things, he only stood half-ashamed over the passionate thoughts that flamed in his brain as he gazed into the half-laughing eyes of the girl.
They sat and talked of many things. Hillary forgot the outside world. He half fancied he had been sitting there for thousands of years with that strange girl by his side. He spoke to her of scenes that were remote from Bougainville: of England, of London and the wide bridges over the Thames, and of the deep, dark waters that bore the tall ships away from the white Channel cliffs, taking wanderers to other lands. And as the girl listened she saw old London as some city of enchantment and romance, where cold-eyed men and women tramped down labyrinthine streets by dark walls. In her imagination she even fancied she heard the mighty clock chime the hour over that far-off city of wonder and romance.
“Fancy! And you’ve lived there! Actually seen the great palaces, the spires and towers that I’ve read of and dreamed about!” said Gabrielle. Then she added: “And you’ve seen the queen and the beautiful princesses?”
“Yes, Gabrielle, I have.”
Then she said artlessly: “Weren’t they sorry when you left England for the Solomon Isles?”
For a moment Hillary was grimly silent, then he said: “Well, they were, rather!”
Gabrielle’s innocence and his own mendacity had broken the spell that home-sickness and distance had cast over him, the spell that had enabled him to picture to Gabrielle’s mind the atmosphere of old London in such true perspective. Indeed, as he talked, Bougainville, with all its novelty and heathenish atmosphere, became some dull, drab reality and London a great modern Babylon of his own hungry-souled century. His voice as well as Gabrielle’s became hushed. He was so carried away by his own vivid imagination that he fancied he had dwelt in some ancient city of smoky romance, and had seen a Semiramis on her throne, and Pharaoh-like peoples of a past age. It was only the eerie beauty of Gabrielle’s eyes that awakened him to the reality that blurs man’s inward vision. The girl had handed him a small flower which she had taken from her hair.
“Could anything be more innocent and beautiful,” he thought as he placed that first symbol of the girl’s awakening affection for him in the buttonhole of his brass-bound jacket.
Night had fallen over the island. “I must go,” said Gabrielle. “It’s terribly late.”
“So it is!” Hillary moaned regretfully. Gabrielle hastily jumped into her canoe, fear in her heart over the coming wrath of her father. Hillary had intended to place his arms about her and embrace her before she went, but his chance had gone!