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He knew too well the voluptuous nature of these creamy, unloved women, who had come down to the island of Japat in exchange for the baubles that found their way into the crowns of Persian potentates. He knew too well that they despised the men who called them wives, even though fear held them constantly in bond.
When our friends come to look for us, we will have died from the plague and our bodies will have been burned, as they always are in Japat. There will be no one left to deny the story. All outsiders are to be destroyed even the Persian and Turkish women, who hate their liege lords too well. After to-morrow, no ship is due to put in here for three weeks.
As Wyckholme was the first to die, Skaggs became sole owner of the island and its treasures, and it was he who made the final will in accordance with the original plans. The island of Japat with its jewels and its ancient château of modern construction represented several million pounds sterling.
"He's right," said Britt promptly. "I'll keep my own client on the straight and public path. He's liable to tip over, too." "Deuce take your Browne," said Saunders with mild asperity. "He never rides alone." "I've noticed that," said the Enemy coolly. "He's usually with Lady Deppingham. It's lucky that Japat is free from gossips, gentlemen."
As this tale has to do with the adventures of Taswell Skaggs's heirs and not with the strange old gentleman who sleeps his last sleep literally in the midst of the island of Japat, it is eminently wise to make as little as possible of him. Mr. Skaggs came of a sound old country family in upper England, but seems to have married a bit above his station.
Could anything be more miraculous than that she should come to the unheard-of island of Japat unless, possibly, that he should be there when she came? She was there for him to look upon and love and lose, just as he had dreamed all these months. It mattered little that she was now the wife of Prince Karl of Brabetz; to him she was still the Princess Genevra of Rapp-Thorberg.
"I'll tell you the whole story of Japat, Arch, but not until to-morrow," Chase said to him as they drove toward the Ritz. "I arrived yesterday on the Marquess of B 's yacht the Cricket. Do you know him? Of course you do. Everybody does. The Cricket was cruising down my way and picked me up Bowles and me.
He had shot wild game in South Africa with Sir John Brodney, chief counsellor for the islanders, and, as luck would have it, was to lunch with him on the following day at the Savoy. His soul hungered for excitement, novelty. The next day, when Sir John suddenly proposed that he go out to Japat as the firm's representative, he leaped at the chance.
She had never known a night since she came to Japat when the birds and insects were so mute. A sombre, supernatural calm hung over the island like a pall. Far off, over the black sea, pulsed the fitful glow of an occasional gleam of lightning, faint with the distance which it traversed. There was no moon; the stars were gone; the sky was inky and the air somnolent.
A rather sultry, boresome voyage across the Arabian Sea in a most unhappy steamer which called at Japat on its way to Sidney, depressed her spirits to some extent but not irretrievably. She was very pretty, very smart and delightfully arrogant after a manner of her own.
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