Page:Rowland--The Mountain of Fears.djvu/177

  him, naked to the waist, leaning over me, with his hands full of hot-water bottles, and his mouth full of blasphemies when one of them burned his fingers, the great muscles rippling the fresh skin of his arms as he moved me in the bed and his fierce, handsome face, with its deep lines of hard living, puckered in doubt—one could see the two natures fighting it out within him.

"The officers of the little garrison gave him a wide berth; they were afraid of him. In fact, about everybody in the place was afraid of him, from the Governor-General down to his own native women, of whom he had an interesting collection. He was a sort of blond devil. I am sure that I do not know why he so befriended me, unless it was because it was pleasant to find some one who was not afraid of him.

"I had begun to get about a little, but was still an invalid, when there arrived in the port the auxiliary yacht of the Count Asquin. I was admiring the vessel from our little [ 161 ]