The moon was very bright, casting great, black shadows athwart our way, and now, once our familiar surroundings were left behind, we fell silent or spake only in low voices, awed by the universal hush of all things; for the night was very still and hot and breathless, not a leaf stirred and no sound to hear save the unceasing roar of the surf.
"Martin," says she, very softly, "here is a night of such infinite quiet that I grow almost afraid--"
"Of what?" I demanded, pausing to look down on her where she limped beside me. And then, 'twixt my teeth, "Is it me you fear?"
"Ah no, no!" cries she, slipping her hand within my arm, "Never, never that, you foolish Martin!" And here she looks at me with such a smile that I must needs glance otherwhere, yet methought her cheeks showed pale in the moonlight.
"Why then, what's amiss?" I questioned as we went on again and I very conscious of her hand yet upon my arm.
"I know not," she sighed, "'tis the stillness, mayhap, the loneliness and dreadful solitude, I feel as though some danger threatened."
"A storm, belike," says I, glancing round about us and across the placid sea.
"O Martin, 'tis hateful to be a woman! Why should I fear thus and no reason, 'tis folly!" And here she must pause to stamp her foot at herself. "And yet I do fear!" says she after a while. "O Martin, glad am I to have man like you beside me."
"Though another man might serve as well!" says I, "Of course?"
"Of course, Martin!"
At this I turned to scowl at the placid sea again.
"Any man?" says I at last.
"O Martin, no--how foolish under grow--'any man' might be evil as Black Bartlemy."
"I've heard I am much like him in looks."
"But then you are Martin and he was--Black Bartlemy."
After this we were silent a great while nor spoke again until we had traversed the whole length of Deliverance Sands, then: "What manner of man?" I demanded.
Now at this she turns to look at me and I saw their lips quiver to a little smile that came but to vanish again.
"Something your sort, Martin, but without your gloom and evil tempers and one who could laugh betimes."
"Sir Rupert?" quoth I.
"He was very gay and merry-hearted!" says she.
"Yet suffered you to be beguiled and cast adrift to your great peril!"
"But stayed to do his share of the fighting, Martin."
"Ha!" says I scowling, "'Tis great pity we may not change places, he and I!"