"
At dawn they could see the ragged flotilla of sampans stealing up-river
on the early flood; but of the masts that huddled in vapors by the
farther bank, they had no certainty until sunrise, when the green rag
and the rice-measure appeared still dangling above the Hakka boat.
Even then it was not certain--as Captain Kneebone sourly pointed
out--that her sailors would keep their agreement. And when he had piled,
on the river-steps, the dry wood for their signal fire, a new difficulty
rose. One of the wounded converts was up, and hobbling with a stick; but
the other would never be ferried down any stream known to man. He lay
dying, and the padre could not leave him.
All the others waited, ready and anxious; but no one grumbled because
death, never punctual, now kept them waiting. The flutter of birds,
among the orange trees, gradually ceased; the sun came slanting over
the eastern wall; the gray floor of the compound turned white and
blurred through the dancing heat. A torrid westerly breeze came
fitfully, rose, died away, rose again, and made Captain Kneebone curse.
"A fair wind lost," he muttered.
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