"My dear Ned--"

"That's the one thing they _shan't_ say of me," he pressed on vehemently. "I've tried other ways--but I'm no good at business. I see now that I shall never make money enough to carry out the scheme myself; but at least I can clear out, and not go on being _his_ pensioner--seeing his dreams turned into horses and carpets and clothes--"

He broke off, and leaning on my desk hid his face in his hands. When he looked up again his flush of wrath had subsided.

"Just understand me--it's not _her_ fault. Don't fancy I'm trying for an instant to shift the blame. A woman with children simply obeys the instinct of her sex; she puts them first--and I wouldn't have it otherwise. As far as she's concerned there were no conditions attached--there's no reason why she should make any sacrifice." He paused, and added painfully: "The trouble is, I can't make her see that I am differently situated."

"But, Ned, the climate--what are you going to gain by chucking yourself away?"

He lifted his brows. "That's a queer argument from _you_. And, besides, I'm up to the tricks of all those ague-holes. And I've _got_ to live, you see: I've got something to put through." He saw my look of enquiry, and added with a shy, poignant laugh--how I hear it still!--: "I don't mean only the job in hand, though that's enough in itself; but Paul's work--you understand.--It won't come in _my_ day, of course--I've got to accept that--but my boy's a splendid chap" (the boy was three), "and I tell you what it is, old man, I believe when he grows up _he'll put it through_."

Halidon went to the Mananas, and for two years the journals brought me incidental reports of the work he was accomplishing. He certainly had found a job to his hand: official words of commendation rang through the country, and there were lengthy newspaper leaders on the efficiency with which our representative was prosecuting his task in that lost corner of our colonies. Then one day a brief paragraph announced his death--"one of the last victims of the pestilence he had so successfully combated."