And yet Trent was puzzled.
Monty's furtive glance inland, his half-frightened, half-cunning
denial of any anticipated visit suggested that there was some one
else who was interested in his existence, and some one too with whom
he shared a secret. Trent lit a cigar and sat down upon the sandy
turf. Monty resumed his digging. Trent watched him through the
leaves of a stunted tree, underneath which he had thrown himself.
For an hour or more nothing happened. Trent smoked, and Monty, who
had apparently forgotten all about his visitor, plodded away amongst
the potato furrows, with every now and then a long, searching look
towards the town. Then there came a black speck stealing across
the broad rice-field and up the steep hill, a speck which in time
took to itself the semblance of a man, a Kru boy, naked as he was
born save for a ragged loin-cloth, and clutching something in his
hand. He was invisible to Trent until he was close at hand; it was
Monty whose changed attitude and deportment indicated the approach
of something interesting. He had relinquished his digging and,
after a long, stealthy glance towards the house, had advanced to
the extreme boundary of the potato patch. His behaviour here for
the first time seemed to denote the hopeless lunatic.
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