The Princess made a place beside her for Grey Stuart, and Captain Hilton had paused with Helen Perowne right at the other end of the room. For a moment or two, with rather lowering looks, the hostess seemed disposed to acquiesce in this, but a sudden flush animated her face, and she sent one of her slaves to request that the couple would come up higher, making room for Hilton by her side on the right--Helen being again on Hilton's right. For a few minutes the repast was eaten in silence, but the doctor, who was in excellent spirits, started the conversation, and the next moment there was a regular buzz mingled with laughter; for the Princess threw off all appearance of annoyance, and with the Rajah, devoted herself eagerly to the comforts of her guests. It was a novel and piquant affair; the pale, dim light of the palm-thatched room, with its waving cocoa-trees seen through the open windows; the comparative coolness after the walk through the jungle, and above all the quaint mingling of culture and half-savage life made the visitors delighted with the scene. Then, too, the repast was unexceptionable. The very poorest Malays are clever cooks, and have excellent ideas upon the best ways of preparing a chicken; while the slaves of the Princess had placed such delicious curries and other Eastern dishes before the hungry visitors, that one and all fell to without giving further thought as to the strange kitchen in which everything had been prepared. Delicious sweets and confections, cool acid drinks, evidently prepared from fresh fruits, with an abundance of palm and European wines were there; and the fruits alone would have been a sufficient attraction for the guests. Durians, those strange productions of the fruit-world, that on being opened reveal to the eater so many chestnut-like seeds lying in a cream-like pulp--the said pulp tasting of sweet almonds, well-made custard, sherry, cheese, old shoes, sugar and garlic formed into one delicious whole. Mangosteens, with their glorious nectarine aroma, and plantains or bananas of the choicest flavoured kinds; these, mingled with other fruits luscious and sweet to a degree, but whose names were unknown to the guests, formed a dessert beyond compare. Chumbley, seeing that a good deal of the Resident's attention was taken up elsewhere, divided his time between talking to Grey Stuart and watching the Malay Princess, upon whose countenance not a shade of her former annoyance remained. Every now and then, as her eyes wandered about, she caught Chumbley's glance as he watched her, and she always met it with a frank, open smile, and begged his acceptance of fruit or wine. At the same time, she was constant in her attentions to Hilton and Helen Perowne, selecting choice fruits for them with her own hands, and pressing them to eat. "Well, Miss Stuart, is not this a novelty?" said Chumbley at last. "What do you think of it all?"