Then came a long oblivion.  He floated through cool space away from the imps of torment; his bed was of downy clouds, and on these clouds he drifted with a great shining river under him; and at last the cloud he was in began to shape itself into walls and on these walls were pictures, and a window through which the sun was shining, and a black pennon—­and he heard a soft, wonderful music that seemed to come to him faintly from another world.  Other creatures were at work in his brain now.  They were building up and putting together the loose ends of things.  Carrigan became one of them, working so hard that frequently a pair of dark eyes came out of the dawning of things to stop him, and quieting hands and a voice soothed him to rest.  The hands and the voice became very intimate.  He missed them when they were not near, especially the hands, and he was always groping for them to make sure they had not gone away.

Only once after the floating cloud transformed itself into the walls of the bateau cabin did the chaotic darkness of the sands fully possess him again.  In that darkness he heard a voice.  It was not the voice of Golden-Hair, or of Bateese, or of Jeanne Marie-Anne.  It was close to his ears.  And in that darkness that smothered him there was something terrible about it as it droned slowly the words—­&
ldquo;Has-any-one-seen-black-Roger-Audemard?” He tried to answer, to call back to it, and the voice came again, repeating the words, emotionless, hollow, as if echoing up out of a grave.  And still harder he struggled to reply to it, to say that he was David Carrigan, and that he was out on the trail of Black Roger Audemard, and that Black Roger was far north.  And suddenly it seemed to him that the voice changed into the flesh and blood of Black Roger himself, though he could not see in the darkness—­ and he reached out, gripping fiercely at the warm substance of flesh, until he heard another voice, the voice of Jeanne Marie-Anne Boulain, entreating him to let his victim go.  It was this time that his eyes shot open, wide and seeing, and straight over him was the face of Jeanne Marie-Anne, nearer him than it had been even in the visionings of his feverish mind.  His fingers were clutching her shoulders, gripping like steel hooks.

“M’sieu—­M’sieu David!” she was crying.

For a moment he stared; then his hands and fingers relaxed, and his arms dropped limply.  “Pardon—­I—­I was dreaming,” he struggled weakly.  “I thought—­”

He had seen the pain in her face.  Now, changing swiftly, it lighted up with relief and gladness.  His vision, cleared by long darkness, saw the change come in an instant like a flash of sunshine.  And then—­so near that he could have touched her—­she was smiling down into his eyes.  He smiled back.  It took an effort, for his face felt stiff and unnatural.

“I was dreaming—­of a man—­named Roger Audemard,” he continued to apologize.  “Did I—­hurt you?”