But if Heyst was an angel from on high, sent in answer to prayer, he did not betray his heavenly origin by outward signs.

So, instead of going on his knees, as he felt inclined to do, Morrison stretched out his hand, which Heyst grasped with formal alacrity and a polite murmur in which "Trifle delighted of service," could be just distinguished.

"Miracles do happen," thought the awestruck Morrison. To him, as to all of us in the islands, this wandering

Heyst, who didn't toil or spin visibly, seemed the very last person to be the agent of Providence in an affair concerned with money. The fact of his turning up in Timor or anywhere else was no more wonderful than the settling of a sparrow on one's windowsill at any given moment. But that he should carry a sum of money in his pocket seemed somehow inconceivable.

So inconceivable that as they were trudging together through the sand of the roadway to the customhouse another mud hovel to pay the fine, Morrison broke into a cold sweat, stopped short, and exclaimed in faltering accents:

Victory

II

6

"I say! You aren't joking, Heyst?"

"Joking!" Heyst's blue eyes went hard as he turned them on the discomposed Morrison. "In what way, may I

ask?" he continued with austere politeness.

Morrison was abashed.

"Forgive me, Heyst. You must have been sent by God in answer to my prayer. But I have been nearly off my chump for three days with worry; and it suddenly struck me: `What if it's the Devil who has sent him?'"

"I have no connection with the supernatural," said Heyst graciously, moving on. "Nobody has sent me. I just happened along."

"I know better," contradicted Morrison. "I may be unworthy, but I have been heard. I know it.

For why should you offer "

Heyst inclined his head, as from respect for a conviction in which he could not share. But he Page 9

stuck to his point by muttering that in the presence of an odious fact like this, it was natural Later in the day, the fine paid, and the two of them on board the brig, from which the guard had been removed, Morrison who, besides being a gentleman, was also an honest fellow began to talk about repayment. He knew very well his inability to lay by any sum of money. It was partly the fault of circumstances and partly of his temperament; and it would have been very difficult to apportion the responsibility between the two. Even Morrison himself could not say, while confessing to the fact. With a worried air he ascribed it to fatality.

"I don't know how it is that I've never been able to save. It's some sort of curse. There's always a bill or two to meet."

He plunged his hand into his pocket for the famous notebook so well known in the islands, the fetish of his hopes, and fluttered the pages feverishly.

"And yet look," he went on. "There it is more than five thousand dollars owing. Surely that's something."

He ceased suddenly. Heyst, who had been all the time trying to look as unconcerned as he could, made reassuring noises in his throat. But Morrison was not only honest.