Sir John's ship--Sir John Killigrew's," she explained. "She was
all but ready to sail when... when you came to Arwenack. He was for the
Indies. Instead--don't you see?--out of love for me he will have come
after me upon a forlorn hope of overtaking you ere you could make
Barbary."

"God's light!" said Sakr-el-Bahr, and fell to musing. Then he raised his
head and laughed. "Faith, he's some days late for that!"

But the jest evoked no response from her. She continued to stare at him
with those eager yet timid eyes.

"And yet," he continued, "he comes opportunely enough. If the breeze
that has fetched him is faint, yet surely it blows from Heaven."

"Were it...?" she paused, faltering a moment.

Then, "Were it possible to communicate with him?" she asked, yet with
hesitation.

"Possible--ay," he answered. "Though we must needs devise the means, and
that will prove none so easy."

"And you would do it?" she inquired, an undercurrent of wonder in her
question, some recollection of it in her face.

"Why, readily," he answered, "since no other way presents itself. No
doubt 'twill cost some lives," he added, "but then...." And he shrugged
to complete the sentence.

"Ah, no, no! Not at that price!" she protested. And how was he to know
that all the price she was thinking of was his own life, which she
conceived would be forfeited if the assistance of the Silver Heron were
invoked?

Before he could return her any answer his attention was diverted. A
sullen threatening note had crept into the babble of the crew, and
suddenly one or two voices were raised to demand insistently that Asad
should put to sea at once and remove his vessel from a neighbourhood
become so dangerous. Now, the fault of this was Marzak's. His was the
voice that first had uttered that timid suggestion, and the infection of
his panic had spread instantly through the corsair ranks.

Asad, drawn to the full of his gaunt height, turned upon them the eyes
that had quelled greater clamours, and raised the voice which in its
day had hurled a hundred men straight into the jaws of death without a
protest.

"Silence!" he commanded. "I am your lord and need no counsellors save
Allah. When I consider the time come, I will give the word to row, but
not before. Back to your quarters, then, and peace!"

He disdained to argue with them, to show them what sound reasons there
were for remaining in this secret cove and against putting forth into
the open. Enough