The tangle of palms and liana-draped trees across the Passage became more indistinct and the brilliant moonlight lit up the swirling brown current. An Indian boy passed silently in a narrow curiara. We were his friends—we had given him sixpence and he was off to the little store amid the low thatched huts a few hundred yards down the river, which marked Morawhanna. We knew him only as Frederick, for no white person would ever be told his real name—that of some animal or bird—as such disclosure is against all Indian custom, from the fear of thereby giving others evil power over them. He gave us a quick, shy, half smile, and then all light died from his Mongolian features and he peered sternly into the darkness ahead. Well had he need of fear and caution. We may be sure his purchases were made stealthily and his quick return was certain, for death watched for him in a hundred places. [Illustration: FIG. 72. PALM TANAGER.] The day before, he had testified against three of his tribe—the Caribs—for the murder of his father, and now the stern hand of English justice had closed and the chief murderer was eating his heart out somewhere in a cell beyond the bend of the river. No more could Frederick mingle with his tribe, and on his knees and in tears he had begged Mr. King to keep him and shelter him on the Government Island. The vendetta would follow him through life and it was almost certain he would be killed sooner or later. The calm of the evening was perfect, undisturbed by all this hidden tragedy. When the moon was well clear of the trees, some great frog hidden in the swamp began his rhythmical _kronk! kronk! kronk!_ and tiny bats dashed about, splashing the surface of the water as they drank or snatched floating insects. The _yap! yap!_ of a passing but invisible Skimmer came faintly, and the throbbing roll of a second kind of frog rumbled out of the dusk across the river. The moonlight became ever stronger and now a Kiskadee called sleepily from his great untidy nest in the distant village. A sharp whip-lash of sound came to our ears and we knew that a Parauque[70] had awakened from his diurnal slumber. An answering cry sounded near at hand in the garden and we could distinguish the two connected tones. The splash of paddles announced the return of the rest of our party as an Indian woman began a droning song from the fire before her hut a few yards away.