"Oh, yes; I’ll tell you" The captain of the _Omega_ pulled himself up abruptly "I knew it first as a boy before the mast. My maiden voyage was made into the East; I came to Anjer, saw the native dugouts gather around the ship, examined their wares of fruit and birds and monkeys, rolls of painted cloth and wonderful shells; I saw the consul’s boat bring off the old tin post-box that visited every ship calling at Anjer—it disgorged for my delight, I remember, a letter from my mother, the first home letter that I had ever received at sea; and later in the day, I pulled bow oar in the captain’s, boat when he went ashore to pay the consul a social call. From that time onward, hardly a year passed that I didn’t see the consulate bungalow. When I became master of a vessel, I always used to go ashore and visit the place; it’s beautifully situated among palm trees, with an open view of the roadstead and a winding path leading up from the landing. Old Reardon was glad to see a fellow countryman; we’d have a drink or two, chat for an hour over some month-old piece of news that had just reached this outpost of civilization; then part for another interval, he to hold the lodge of the Orient, I to continue an endless pilgrimage. "Yes, I felt that I knew the consulate bungalow of Anjer pretty well. But, in these quick lands, a house is a mere incident, is nothing but its inhabitants; and my familiarity with this structure in Reardon’s time didn’t exactly prepare me for what I was afterwards to meet between its walls.... And now I’ll have to begin at the beginning" *II* He waited so long in silence that we began to grow impatient. A faint evening breeze drew across the water, bringing the heavy scent of the land. Above the Anjer hills hung a full golden moon, beneath which, in vague, translucent shadow, the shores of Java seemed sunk in an enchanted calm.