He did not understand it. He could not imagine why it was, why it should be so. There was no logic in it all. Logically he should be loved, not hated, however strict and authoritative he might be considered. Indeed, did he not often temper his authoritative strictness with the jovial laugh under his thick moustache, with a friendly, genial warning and exhortation? Was he not on circuit a pleasant resident, who regarded the circuit with his officials as a relaxation, as a delightful trip on horseback through the coffee-plantations, touching at the go-downs in each; as a jolly excursion, which relaxed one's muscles after all those weeks of office-work: the big staff of district heads following on their little horses, riding their skittish animals like nimble monkeys, with flags in their hands; with the native orchestra tinkling out its blithe crystal notes of welcome wherever he went; with the carefully prepared dinner in the dak-bungalow in the evening and the rubber till late at night? Had not his officials, in informal moments, told him that he was a regular sport of a resident, an indefatigable rider, jovial at meals and so young that he would actually take the scarf from the nautch-girl and dance with her for a moment, very cleverly performing the lissom ritual movements of the hands and feet and hips, instead of buying himself off with a rix-dollar and leaving her to dance with the district head? Never did he feel so happy as on circuit. And now that he was gloomy and depressed, dissatisfied, not knowing what hidden forces were opposing him in the dusk--straight, honest man that he was, a man of simple principles, a serious worker--he thought that he would go on circuit soon and, by that diversion, rid himself of the gloom that was oppressing him. He would ask Theo to go with him, for the sake of a few days' change.