Up the bamboo ladder and into the little door,—so low that even Anak, with her
scant twelve years, was forced to stoop,—she would dart when she espied Noa
coming sedately down the long aisle of palms that led away to the fungus-
covered canal that separated her little world from the life of the capital city.
There was coquetry in every glance, as she watched him, from behind the carved
bars of her low window, drop contentedly down on the bench beneath a scarred
old cocoanut that stood directly before the door. She thought almost angrily that
he ought to have searched a little for her: she would have repaid him with her
arms about his neck.
From the cool darkness of the bungalow came the regular click of her mother’s
loom. She could see the worker’s head surrounded by a faint halo of broken
twilight. Her mind filled in the details that were hidden by the green shadows—
the drawn, stooping figure, the scant black hair, the swollen gums, the syrah-
stained teeth, and sunken neck. She impulsively ran her soft brown fingers over
her own warm, plump face, through the luxuriant tresses of her heavy hair, and
then gazed out at the recumbent figure on the bench, waiting patiently for her
coming.
“Soon my teeth, which the American lady that was visiting his Excellency said
were so strong and beautiful, will be filed and blackened, and I will be weaving
sarongs for Noa.”
She shuddered, she knew not why, and went slowly across the elastic bamboo
strips of the floor and down the ladder.
Noa watched the trim little figure with its single covering of cotton, the straight,
graceful body, and perfectly poised head and delicate neck, the bare feet and
ankles, the sweet, comely face with its fresh young lips, free from the red stains
of the syrah leaf, and its big brown eyes that looked from beneath heavy silken
lashes. He smiled, but did not stir as she came to him. He was proud of her after
the manner of his kind. Her beauty appealed to him unconsciously, although he
had never been taught to consider beauty, or even seek it. He would have
married her without a question, if she had been as hideous as his sister, who was
scarred with the small-pox. He would never have complained if, according to
Malayan custom, he had not been permitted to have seen her until the marriage
day. He must marry some one, now that the Prince had gone to Johore, and his