and never a word betwixt us for a while. At last:

"So endeth our solitude, Martin!"

"Aye!"

"Our deliverance is come!" says she and then, very softly, "Doth not
this rejoice you?" Here answer found I none, since now at last I knew
this the very thing I had come most to dread. So was silence again
save for these hoarse unlovely voices where they launched and boarded
the longboat. "Master Adam would have me go on board, Martin, but 'tis
near dawn so will I bide with you to welcome this new day."

"I'm glad you stayed, Damaris." At this I felt her clasp tighten on my
fingers, and so she brings me to a rock hard by and, sinking on the
warm sand, would have me sit by her; thus, side by side, we watched the
boat pull away to the ship, and presently all about us was hushed and
still save for the never-ceasing murmur of the surge.

"Martin," says she in a while, "with this new day beginneth for us a
new life! In a few short hours we sail for England."

"England! Aye, to be sure!" says I, mighty doleful, but, conscious of
her regard, strove to look happy yet made such a botch of it that,
getting to her knees, she takes my hang-dog face betwixt her two hands.

"O but you are glad?" she questions, a little breathlessly, "Glad to
come with me to England--to leave this wilderness?"

"Aye!" I nodded, well-nigh choking on the word.

"Dear Martin, look at me!" she commanded, "Now speak me plain. Whence
is your grief?"

"O, my lady," quoth I, "'tis the knowledge of my unworthiness, my
unloveliness, my rude and graceless ways; England is no place for like
of me. I am well enough here in the wild--to work for you, fight for
you an' need be, but how may I compare with your fine gallants and
courtly gentlemen?"

Now at this she clasps me all sudden in her arms and setting soft cheek
to mine falls a-chiding me, yet kissing me full oft, calling me
"silly," "dear," "foolish," and "beloved."

"How shall you compare?" cries she, "Thus and thus, dear Martin--so
infinitely above and beyond all other men that unless you wed me needs
must I die a maid!"

Thus did she comfort me, soothing my fears, and thus the dawn found us.

"O 'tis day!" she sighed, "'Tis day already!" And now 'twas her voice
was doleful whiles her eyes gazed regretful round about the white sands
of Deliverance and the tree-clad highlands beyond. "O indeed I do love
this dear island of ours, Martin!"

Sudden upon the stilly air was the beat of oars, an