That paean of joy and thanksgiving which ought to have greeted this divine largesse, died on the lips of the beholders when they saw the state of their island.  Nepenthe was hardly recognizable.  The Saint had lifted a mantle from Heaven only to reveal the desolation on earth.  Ashes everywhere.  Trees, houses, the fertile fields, the mountain slopes—­all were smothered under a layer of monotonous pallor.  They knew what it meant.  It meant ruin to their crops and vineyards.  None the less, they raised a shout, a half-hearted shout, of praise.  For Nepentheans are born politicians and courteous by nature.  It is their heritage from the Good Duke Alfred to “keep smiling.”  A shout was expected of them under the circumstances; it costs nothing and may even do good, inasmuch as Saint Dodekanus could remove the ashes as easily as he had sent them.  Why not shout?

“A miracle, a miracle!” the cry went up.  “Long life to our patron!”

A poor tribute; but the Saint took note of it.  Half an hour had barely passed ere the sky grew cloudy.  Moist drops began to fall.  It was the first rain for many weeks, and foreign visitors, accustomed to think of Nepenthe as a rainless land, were almost as interested in the watery shower as in that of the ashes.  Mud, such mud as the oldest midwife could not remember, encumbered the roofs, the fields, the roadways.  It looked as if the whole island were plastered over with a coating of liquid chocolate.  Now, if the shower would only continue—­

Suddenly it ceased.  The sky grew clear.

Saint Dodekanus had often been accused of possessing a grain of malice.  Some went so far as to say he had the Evil Eye.  It was by no means the first time in his long career that the natives had found cause to complain of a certain rancour in his temperament—­of certain spiteful viperish acts to which the priests, and they alone, were able to give a benevolent interpretation.  Now their wrath blazed out against the celestial Patron.  “He’s not fit for his job,” said some; “let’s get a new saint!  The ruffian, the son of an impure mother—­up to his tricks, was he?  Ah, the cut-throat, the Saracen, the old paederast:  into the ditch with him!”

During a brief moment his fate hung in the balance.  For it was plain that the ashes, if unwetted, might ultimately have been blown away by the wind.  But what was going to happen when all this mud, baked by the sun into the hardness of brick, covered the island?

Perhaps the Saint was only putting their tempers to the test.  The experiment of another shout was worth trying.  One could always punish him later on.

So feeble was the noise that Saint Dodekanus must have had uncommonly good ears.  He had.  And soon showed his real feelings.  Rain fell once more.  Instead of diminishing it grew more violent, accompanied by warm blasts of wind.  There was sunshine overhead, but the peaks were shrouded in scudding vapours, trees bent under the force of the wind; the sea, a welter of light and shade, was dappled with silvery patches under the swiftly careering clouds.  Soon there came a blinding downpour.  Gullies were blocked up with mud; rills carried tons of it into the sea.  Then the gale died down; the sun beamed out of a bright evening sky.  The miraculous shower was over.