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The older child was being made much of among the relatives, but the little one was crying passionately for her mother in a corner by herself. My runner had taken a circuitous path up the hill to the house, and I could see directly into the room, and, indeed, hear all that passed. I, however, only caught a dim glimpse of the older child. She went over to her little sister once and endeavored to comfort her, but was called away by some bitter relative.

Phil Evans took the sobbing little one in his arms, and brushed the tangled curls out of her eyes. They were larger than Japanese eyes, and so bright. They looked right into the young man's face as though trying to read it. Something in the expression of genuine tenderness and pity for her assured her that she was with a friend. She let her little restless head sink contentedly on his shoulder, while one little hand stole caressingly to his face.

“Oo, such nize mans. Koto so tired,” she murmured in almost unintelligible English, and a few minutes afterward was asleep.

“Come, Phil. We must go now,” his sister told him after a while. He had wandered outside the house, and was sitting on the trunk of a fallen tree, looking thoughtfully down at the sleeping child in his arms. She was the prettiest little one he had ever seen, and Phil's weakness lay in his love for children. Her hair was very black and silky, but when the sun touched it, strange gleams of dark red seemed to reflect back the light. It was the child's Saxon blood, perhaps. A half-caste's hair is usually either black or dark red, that is, black hair with red in it. The little one had long black silky lashes and russet red cheeks.

“Poor little thing!” murmured Beryl, pityingly, “I suppose its days of love and perhaps happiness are over now that its only real friend is gone—its mother. These Japanese despise and dislike it for its father's sake. They will neglect it, maybe mistreat it.”

Philip uttered a short, quick ejaculation, and rose to his feet.

“Beryl, they wouldn't; no one could be anything but kind to a dear little thing like this. No! I won't, I couldn't believe it. Besides, it is the nature of the Japanese to be gentle and tender. Everyone says so.”

“Oh, I didn't mean they'd be cruel exactly, but why, they'd neglect it, let it alone altogether. Besides, there are ways of being cruel to people without hurting them— physically, I mean. We must be going now, Phil. I promised Frank to be home soon. He does not know where we are.” She beckoned to the Japanese to take the child from him.

“What—who—will take care of her?” the young man questioned.

“Tha's whad I dunno,” the man said indifferently. “Mos' those relatives b'long nudder hosban'—nod to the girl. She have vaery few relatives—vaery poor girl when our relative marry with her.”

“Oh! then she would not even be brought up by her own relatives.”

“Tha's so,” the man admitted, shrugging his shoulders. The young man took a few slow strides up and down, holding the little one close to him, resting his chin against the little dark head. He stopped short in his walk of a sudden.

“Can I have her?” he said simply.

“Phil, are you crazy?”

“No; I—I—never wanted anything so much in my life before,” he said boyishly. “I'd be good to her, Beryl, really I would. I'd—”

“Yes, I know all about it. You'd be good,” his sister was laughing, “of course, you would be—in your way. You silly boy. Why, you don't know anything about bringing a child up—the responsibility, the care, the—”

“I'd keep her with me till she grew a little older, and then she could go to school like any other child, and—why, Beryl, I could—learn.”

“Learn! Oh, silly, come on now, like a good boy. Now, what would Miss Morgan say?”

“Miss Morgan? Oh, I—I forgot her,” he confessed, a trifle despondently now.

“Forgot Miss Morgan! You haven't been her shadow for all these weeks for nothing, have you?”

For the first time in Philip's life, perhaps, he was glad of his youth.

“No; I like her, of course, but—but—er—I'm only eighteen, you know, Beryl.”

“Yes, eighteen years, too young to marry, and—er—too young, certainly, to be a papa of a baby of two and more.”

The young man was hesitating. The child moved restlessly in its sleep, sighing, as children do after having cried themselves to sleep. Unconsciously it snuggled closer in his arms.

“I—I can't—I won't give her up,” the young man said. He turned to the Japanese, and his voice was quite determined. “Can I have her?”

The man consulted for a while among the relatives, and after a short, a very short, colloquy, informed Philip of their unanimous consent. He could not help thinking that they were glad to be rid of her.

“Just one thing more,” he said, and his voice had a full manly ring now. “Here is my permanent address. Any mail addressed to me there will be forwarded to me wherever I am. When this little one's sister is old enough, and if she wishes, you will permit her to write to her?”

“Yes,” they agreed.

“And—” he added, blushing, “I will try and have her always remember her mother's country and her sister. We will take some Japanese woman as maid or nurse to her, and she won't forget her own language then.”

And so three, instead of two, rode back in me to the hotel. Maybe the small added burden was responsible for the creaking I did. But, no, that was only my joyful laughter. I could not contain myself, for I was so happy in their goodness.

I do not know what he said to his friends or relatives, what explanation he made. He was doubtless independent of them all, and I know he did not regret his bargain, for, for many days before they sailed, I would see them together, always together, those two, always laughing and happy. They stayed for some months longer on the island and then one day, the day after Beryl's marriage to Montrose, they all took passage for America, and I saw the last of them for many, many years.