The stained bronze cannon still poked their ancient and flaring muzzles out over the lake; farther along crimson hibiscus blossoms blazed from every hedge; and above him the stately plumes of royal palms hung motionless, tufting the trunks, which rose with the shaft-like dignity of slender Egyptian pillars into a cloudless sky.

On he went, along endless hedges of azalea and oleander, past thickets of Spanish-bayonet, under leaning cocoanut-palms; and at last the huge banyan-tree rose sprawling across the sky-line, and he saw the white facades and red-tiled roofs beyond.

All around him now, as the air grew sweet with the breath of orange blossoms, a subtler scent, delicately persistent, came to him on the sea-wind; and he remembered it!—­the lilac perfume of China-berry in bloom; Calypso’s own immortal fragrance.  And, in the brilliant sunshine, there under green trees with the dome of blue above, unbidden, the shadows of the past rose up; and once more lantern-lit faces crowded through the aromatic dark; once more the fountains’ haze drifted across dim lawns; once more he caught the faint, uncertain rustle of her gown close to him as she passed like a fresh breath through the dusk.

Overhead a little breeze became entangled in the palmetto fronds, setting them softly clashing together as though a million unseen elfin hands were welcoming his return; the big black-and-gold butterflies, beating up against the sudden air current, flapped back to their honeyed haven in the orange grove; bold, yellow-eyed grackle stared at him from the grass; a bird like a winged streak of flame flashed through the jungle and was gone.

And now every breath he drew was quickening his pulses with the sense of home-coming; he saw the red-bellied woodpeckers sticking like shreds of checked gingham to the trees, turning their pointed heads incuriously as he passed; the welling notes of a wren bubbled upward through the sun-shot azure; high in the vault above an eagle was passing seaward, silver of tail and crest, winged with bronze; and everywhere on every side glittered the gold-and-saffron dragon-flies of the South like the play of sunbeams on a green lagoon.

Under the sapodilla-trees on the lawn two aged, white-clad negro servants were gathering fruit forbidden them; and at sight of him two wrinkled black hands furtively wiped two furrowed faces free from incriminating evidence; two solemn pairs of eyes rolled piously in his direction.

“Mohnin’, suh, Mistuh Hamil.”

“Good morning, Jonas; good morning, Archimedes.  Mr. Cardross is in the orange grove, I see.”

And, smiling, passed the guilty ones with a humorously threatening shake of his head.

A black boy, grinning, opened the gate; the quick-stepping figure in white flannels glanced around at the click of the latch.

“Hamil!  Good work!  I am glad to see you!”—­his firm, sun-burnt hands closing over Hamil’s—­“glad all through!”