ey met.

"He's coming!" Isabel said.

Wrayford disengaged his hands.

"He may only be out for a turn before he goes to bed. Wait a minute.
I'll see." He felt his way to the bench, scrambled up on it, and
stretching his body forward managed to bring his eyes in line with the
opening above the door.

"It's as black as pitch. I can't see anything."

The refrain rang out nearer.

"Wait! I saw something twinkle. There it is again. It's his cigar. It's
coming this way--down the path."

There was a long rattle of thunder through the stillness.

"It's the storm!" Isabel whispered. "He's coming to see about the
launch."

Wrayford dropped noiselessly from the bench and she caught him by the
arm.

"Isn't there time to get up the path and slip under the shrubbery?"

"No, he's in the path now. He'll be here in two minutes. He'll find us."

He felt her hand tighten on his arm.

"You must go in the skiff, then. It's the only way."

"And let him find you? And hear my oars? Listen--there's something I
must say."

She flung her arms about him and pressed her face to his.

"Isabel, just now I didn't tell you everything. He's ruined his
mother--taken everything of hers too. And he's got to tell her; it can't
be kept from her."

She uttered an incredulous exclamation and drew back.

"Is this the truth? Why didn't you tell me before?"

"He forbade me. You were not to know."

Close above them, in the shrubbery, Stilling warbled:

"_Nita, Juanita,
Ask thy soul if we must part!_"

Wrayford held her by both arms. "Understand this--if he comes in, he'll
find us. And if there's a row you'll lose your boy."

She seemed not to hear him. "You--you--you--he'll kill you!" she
exclaimed.

Wrayford laughed impatiently and released her, and she stood shrinking
against the wall, her hands pressed to her breast. Wrayford straightened
himself and she felt that he was listening intently. Then he dropped to
his knees and laid his hands against the boards of the sliding floor. It
yielded at once, as if with a kind of evil alacrity; and at their feet
they saw, under the motionless solid night, another darker night that
moved and shimmered. Wrayford threw himself back against the opposite
wall, behind the door.

A key rattled in the lock, and after a moment's fumbling the door swung
open. Wrayford and Isabel saw a man's black bulk against the obscurity.
It moved a step, lurched forward, and vanished out of sight. From