A TRUCE Though his eyes, like live coals, glowered with sullen fire at the strip of sand and the rocks in front, his troubled brain paid perfunctory heed to his task.

The stern sense of duty, the ingrained force of long years of military discipline and soldierly thought, compelled him to keep watch and ward over his fortress, but he could not help asking himself what would happen if Iris were seriously wounded.
There was one enemy more potent than these skulking Dyaks, a foe more irresistible in his might, more pitiless in his strength, whose assaults would tax to the utmost their powers of resistance.

In another hour the sun would be high in the heavens, pouring his ardent rays upon them and drying the blood in their veins.
Hitherto, the active life of the island, the shade of trees, hut or cave, the power of unrestricted movement and the possession of water in any desired quantity, robbed the tropical heat of the day of its chief terrors.

Now all was changed.

Instead of working amidst grateful foliage, they were bound to the brown rock, which soon would glow with radiated energy and give off scorching gusts like unto the opening of a furnace-door.
This he had foreseen all along.