This puzzled the half-breed sorely.

It may have been that Oscard knew men better than his indifferent manner would have led the observer to believe.

Durnovo's was just one of those natures which in good hands might have been turned to good account.

Too much solitude, too much dealing with negro peoples, and, chiefly, too long a sojourn in the demoralising atmosphere of West Africa, had made a worse man of Victor Durnovo than Nature originally intended.

He was not wholly bad.