He followed her; he was wearing a black alpaca jacket, because he had to go to the resident presently. "How's Ida?" asked Eva. "Did she sleep well after her séance of last night?" "Only fairly well," said Frans van Helderen. "I don't think she ought to do any more. She kept waking with a start, falling on my neck and begging me to forgive her, I don't know what for." "It didn't upset me at all," said Eva, "though I don't understand it in the least." She opened the godown, called the cook and gave the woman her orders. The cook was latta; [10] and Eva loved teasing the old thing. "La ... la-illa-lala!" she cried. And the cook gave a start and echoed the cry and recovered herself the next moment, begging for forgiveness. "Throw down, cook, throw down!" cried Eva, in Malay. And the cook, acting on the suggestion, flung down a tray of litchis and mangosteens and, at once recovering, stooped and picked up the scattered fruits from the floor, imploring to be forgiven and shaking her head and clicking her tongue. "Come, we'd better go!" said Eva to Frans. "Else she'll be breaking my eggs presently. "Out of this, cook, outside!" "Out of this, outside!" echoed the latta cook. "Oh, mem sahib, beg pardon, mem sahib, oh, enough, enough, mem sahib!" "Come and sit down for a little," said Eva to Van Helderen. He went with her: "You're so cheerful," he said. "Aren't you?" "No, I've been feeling sad, lately." "I too. I told you so yesterday. It's something in the Labuwangi air. There's no telling what this table-turning has in store for us." They sat down in the back verandah. He sighed. "What's the matter?" she asked. "I can't help it," he said. "I care for you so. I love you." She was silent for an instant. "Again?" she then said, reproachfully. He did not answer. "I have told you, mine is not a passionate nature. I am cold. I love my husband and my child. Let's be friends, Van Helderen." "I'm fighting against it; but it's no use." "I'm fond of Ida; I wouldn't make her unhappy for the world." "I don't believe I was ever fond of her." "Van Helderen!..." "If I was, it was only for her pretty face. But white though Ida may be, she's a half-caste ... with her whimsies and her childish little tragedies. I didn't see it so much at first, but I see it now, of course. I'd met women from Europe before I met you. But you were a revelation to me, a revelation of all the charm and artistic grace that a woman can possess.... And the exotic side in you appeals to my own exotic side." "I value your friendship highly. Let things remain as they are." "Sometimes it's just as though I were mad, sometimes I dream ... that we're travelling in Europe together, that we're in Italy or Paris. Sometimes I see us sitting together over a fire, in a room of our own, you talking of art, I of the modern, social developments of our time. But, after that, I see us together ... more intimately...." "Van Helderen!..."