unless it was by her complete silence. John's coming into
the boat we managed with sufficient dexterity; aided by the horrified
Charley, who now arrived personally in the other boat, and was for
taking all three of us into that. But this was altogether unnecessary;
he was made to understand that such transferences as it would occasion
were superfluous, and so one of his men stepped into our boat to help me
to row back against the current; and for this I was not unthankful.

Our return took, it appeared to me, a much longer time than everything
else which had happened. When I looked over my shoulder at the Hermana,
she seemed an incredible distance off, and when I looked again, she had
grown so very little nearer that I abandoned this fruitless proceeding.
Charley's boat had gone ahead to announce the good news to General
Rieppe as soon as possible. But if our return was long to me, to
Hortense it was not so. She sat beside her lover in the stern, and I
knew that he was more to her than ever: it was her spirit also that
wanted him now. Poor Kitty's words of prophecy had come perversely true:
"Something will happen, and that boy'll be conspicuous." Well, it had
happened with a vengeance, and all wrong for Kitty, and all wrong for
me! Then I remembered Charley, last of all. My doubt as to what he would
have done, had he been on deck, was settled later by learning from his
own lips that he did not know how to swim.

Yes, the sentimental world (and by that I mean the immense and mournful
preponderance of fools, and not the few of true sentiment) would soon
be exclaiming: "How romantic! She found her heart! She had a glimpse of
Death's angel, and in that light saw her life's true happiness!" But I
should say nothing like that, nor would Miss Josephine St. Michael, if I
read that lady at all right. She didn't know what I did about Hortense.
She hadn't overheard Sophistication confessing amorous curiosity about
Innocence; but the old Kings Port lady's sound instinct would tell her
that a souse in the water wasn't likely to be enough to wash away the
seasoning of a lifetime; and she would wait, as I should, for the day
when Hortense, having had her taste of John's innocence, and having
grown used to the souse in the water, would wax restless for the
Replacers, for excitement, for complexity, for the prismatic life. Then
it might interest her to corrupt John; but if she couldn't, where would
her occupation be, and how were they