"No. You have never been delirious, so I never needed to leave you."

"A quibble," murmured Heron, with the faintest possible smile.

"However--I'm not sorry to have you here. You'll stay now, even if I talk nonsense?"

"Of course I will." Brian was glad of the request.

In another moment the patient had relapsed into insensibility; but, curiously enough, after this, conversation, Percival's mind began to wander, and he "talked nonsense" as persistently as the others had done.

Brian could not see why he had at first told him to keep away. He was quite prepared for some revelation of strong feeling against himself, but none ever came. Elizabeth's name occurred very frequently; but for the most, part, it was connected with reminiscences of the past of which Brian knew nothing. Early meetings, walks about London, boy and girl quarrels were talked of, but about recent events he was silent.

Brian wondered whether he himself and Fenwick would also succumb to the malarious influences of the place; but these two escaped. Fenwick was never ill; and Brian grew stronger every day. When Percival opened his eyes once more upon him, after three weeks of illness, he said, abruptly:--

"Ah, if you had looked like that when you came on board the _Arizona_, I should never have been deceived."

Brian smiled, and made no answer. Percival watched him hobbling about the room for some minutes, and then said:--

"How long have we been on the island?"

"Forty-seven days."

"And not a sail in sight the whole time?"

"Two, but they did not come near enough to see our signals--or passed them by."

"My God!" said Percival, faintly. "Will it never end?" And then he turned away his face.

After a little silence he asked, uneasily:--

"Did I say much when I was ill?"

"Nothing of any consequence."

"But about you," said Percival, turning his hollow eyes on Brian with painful earnestness, "did I talk about you? Did I say----"

"You never mentioned my name so far as I know. So make your mind easy on that score. Now, don't talk any more: you are not fit for it. You must eat, and drink, and sleep, so as to be ready when that dilatory ship comes to take us off."

Percival did his duty in these respects. He was a more docile patient than Brian had expected to find him. But he did not seem to recover his buoyant spirits with his strength. He had long fits of melancholy brooding, in which the habitual line between his brows became more marked than ever. But it was not until two or three weeks more of their strangely monotonous existence had passed by, that Brian Luttrell got any clue to the kind of burden that was weighing upon Heron's mind.

The day had been fiercely hot, but the night was cool, and Brian had half-closed the door through which the sea-breeze was blowing, and the light of the stars shone down. He and Percival continued to share this hut (the other being tenanted by the three seamen), and Brian was sitting on the ground, stirring up a compound of cocoa-nut milk, eggs and brandy, with which he meant to provide Percival for supper. Percival lay, as usual, on his couch, watching his movements by the starlight.

When the draught had been swallowed, Heron said:--

"Don't go to sleep yet. I wish you would sit down here. I want to say something."

Brian complied, and Percival went on in his usual abrupt fashion.

"You know I rather thought I should not get better."

"I know."

"It might have been more convenient if I had not. Did you never feel so?"

"No, never."

"If I had been buried on the Rocas Reef," said Percival, with biting emphasis, "you would have kept your promise, gone back to England, and--married Elizabeth."

"I never considered that possibility," answered Brian, with perfect quietness and some coldness.

"Then you're a better fellow than I am. Look here," said Percival, with vehemence, "in your place I could not have nursed a man through an illness as you have done. The temptation would have been too strong: I should have killed him."

"I am sure you would have done nothing of the kind, Heron. You are incapable of treachery."

"You won't say so when you know all that I am going to tell you. Prepare your mind for deeds of villainy," said Percival, rallying his forces and trying to laugh; "for I am going to shock your virtuous ear. It's been on my mind ever since I was taken ill; and I was so afraid that I should let it out when I was light-headed, that, as you know, I asked you not to stay with me."

"Don't tell me now: I'll take it on trust. Any time will do," said Brian, shrinking a little from the allusion to his own story that he knew would follow.

"No time like the present," responded Heron, obstinately. "I've been a pig-headed brute; that's the chief thing. Now, don't interrupt, Luttrell. Miss Murray, you know, was engaged to me when you first saw her."

"Yes, but I didn't know it!" said Brian, with vehemence almost equal to Percival's own.

"Of course you didn't. I understand all that. It was the most natural thing in the world for you to admire her."

"Admire her!" repeated Brian, in an enigmatic tone.

"Let the word stand for something stronger if you don't like it. Perhaps you do not know that your friend, Dino Vasari, the man who claimed to be Brian Luttrell, betrayed your secrets to me. It was he who told me your name, and your love for Miss Murray. She had mentioned that to me, too; or rather I made her tell me."

"Dino confessed that he had been to you," said Brian, who was sitting with his hand arched over his eyes. "He had some wild idea of making a sort of compromise about the property, to which I was to be a party."

"Did he tell you the terms of the compromise?"

"No."

"Then I won't--just now. I'll tell you what I did, Luttrell, and you may call me a cad for it, if you like: I refused to do anything towards bringing about this compromise, and, although I knew when you were to sail, I did not try to detain you! You should have heard the blowing-up I had afterwards from old Colquhoun for not dropping a word to him!"

"I am very glad you did not. He could not have hindered me."

"Yes, he could. Or I could. Some of us would have hindered you, you may depend on it. And, if I had said that word, don't you see, you would never have set foot in the _Falcon_ nor I in the _Arizona_, and we should both have been safe at home, instead of disporting ourselves, like Robinson Crusoe and his man Friday, on a desert island."

"It's too late to think of that now," said Brian, rather sadly.

"Too late! that's the worst of it. You've the right to reproach me. Of course, I know I was to blame."

"No, I don't see that. I don't reproach you in the least. You knew so little, that it must have seemed unnecessary to make a fuss about what you had heard."

"I heard quite enough," said Percival, with a short laugh. "I knew what I ought to do--and I didn't do it. That's the long and the short of it.

If I had spoken, you would not be here. That makes the sting of it to me now."

"Don't think of that. I don't mind. You made up for all by coming after me."

"I think," said Percival, emphatically, "that if a word could have killed you when I first knew who you were, you wouldn't have had much chance of life, Luttrell. I was worse than that afterwards. If ever I had the temptation to take a man's life----"