Devereux stiffened in his seat, and the light suddenly went out of his eyes. He gazed at her a moment like a rudely awakened somnambulist. Then he slumped in the corner, as if felled by a sharp invisible blow. The woman nodded to us, and we drove rapidly away. He was ill for several days after that, keeping close in his room. When he was able to come on deck again, we had reached well across the Celebes Sea, and were about to make Sibutu Passage on the coast of Borneo. We watched him anxiously that forenoon for signs of a return of his malady. But he’d evidently forgotten the incident in Macassar; he talked with us all day in a normal manner, without reference to his affairs. It seemed as if the worst of the attack was over. A long, narrow island lies on the west side of Sibutu Passage, clear of the mainland and hiding several smaller islands behind it. This was sighted while we were at dinner that noon; when we came up for our cigars, it stood in plain view on the lee bow. Being an island against the main, with land rising behind it as we came on, we didn’t think of it as a possible new source of excitement. As the afternoon passed, however, Nichols called my attention to Devereux, who was acting strangely again. For a while he would lean against the lee rail, talking rapidly to himself; suddenly he would leave that off and take to pacing the deck in short, quick turns, rubbing his hands together. His eyes, it was to be noticed, kept watching the island, now less than four miles away. His face worked with nervous energy. His whole air was one of suppressed excitement, mingled with a certain quiet elation. "He’s using that Polynesian dialect!" Nichols exclaimed in a worried whisper "What can we do with him? We must pass the island" "Can’t you stop there long enough to set him ashore—convince him that it isn’t his island?" I suggested. Nichols considered soberly, then shook his head. "It wouldn’t work" said he "First place, the currents are bad, there’s no harbour or village, and no anchorage, so far as I’m aware. Second place, would anything convince him? Even if there was once a real island, mightn’t this one, in his present condition, look as good as the next to him? Suppose he were to insist on a hunt for the inhabitants? We’d have to bring him away in the end—and that might only prolong the agony" "I guess you’re right, Nichols; but what’s the alternative?" "Tack ship, and stand away till night" he answered without hesitation "Slip through the passage under cover of darkness. Trust to luck that he’ll change the mood again tomorrow, and forget what he saw this afternoon. We can get him to sleep somehow—drug him if necessary" "But he’ll make a row at once, when you tack ship" "I suppose so. We’ll have to play him at his own game"