"You needn't," replied the girl. She turned to the war correspondent.
"Any new drums?"

"I remember that day. You were scared half to death at my walls."

"Small wonder! I was only twelve; and I dreamed of cannibals for
weeks."

"Drums! I wonder if any living man has heard a greater variety
than I? What a lot of them! I have heard them calling a jehad in
the Sudan. Tumpi-tum-tump! tumpitum-tump! Makes a white man's
hair stand up when he hears it in the night. I don't know what it
is, but the sound drives the Oriental mad. And that reminds me
- I've had them in mind all day - the drums of jeopardy!"

"What an odd phrase! And what are the drums of jeopardy?" asked
Kitty, leaning on her arms. Odd, but suddenly she felt a longing
to go somewhere, thousands and thousands of miles away. She had
never been west of Chicago or east of Boston. Until this moment
she had never felt the call of the blood - her father's. Cocoanut
palms and birds of paradise! And drums in the night going
tumpi-tum-tump! tumpi-tum-tump!

"I've always been mad over green things," began Cutty. "A wheat
field in the spring, leafing maples. It's Nature's choice and mine.
My passion is emeralds; and I haven't any because those I want are
beyond reach. They are owned by the great houses of Europe and
Asia, and lie in royal caskets; or did. If I could go into a mine
and find an emerald as big as my fist I should be only partly happy
if it chanced to be of fine colour. In a little while I should lose