Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/30

 Love at first sight is a disease very prevalent in Asia, for with the Oriental the lust of the eye is ever the mightiest of forces, and the sorry pretence that the mind rules the passions is not recognized by him as a tenet subscription to which is demanded by self-respect. The Malays name it "the madness," and by this Kria now was smitten, suddenly and without warning, as men sometimes are stricken down by the stroke of a vertical sun. Pi-Noi might be a daughter of the despised jungle-folk, an infidel. an eater of unclean things, a creature of the forest almost as wild as the beasts with which she shared a common home; but to Kria she was what the first woman was to the first man. She was more. Standing thus upon the river's brink, with her feet in the crystal ripples, with the tangle of vegetation making for her lithe figure a wondrous background. with the sunlight playing in and out of the swaying. green canopy above her head and dappling her clear skin with shifting splashes of brightness and shadow, she symbolized for him the eternal triumph of her sex—the tyrannous, unsought power of woman.

Pi-Noi, after looking curiously at the Malay, spoke to her countrymen in their own language, and Kria, who had acquired a working knowledge of the primitive jungle jargon, answered her himself:

"We are going up-stream to Chĕ-ba' Pĕr-lan-i. The boat is large and your little body will not sink it. We will bear you with us. Come!"

She looked at him quizzically, and her face was softened by a little ripple of laughter. It was the