"Surely not," he replied; "but then, since you are so averse to my company, I must make sure that my boat does not become as fast as yours on this ebb-tide, otherwise we should both have to wait till the flood."
"Oh, beg pardon! I now understand. But how can you reach me?"
"Wade," he replied coolly, proceeding to take off his shoes and stockings.
"What! through that horrid black mud?"
"I couldn"t leap that distance, Miss Madison."
"It"s too bad! I"m so provoked with myself! The mud may be very deep, or there may be a quicksand or something."
"In which case I should merely disappear a little earlier;" and he sprang overboard up to his knees, dragged the boat till it was sufficiently fast in the ooze to be stationary, then he waded ash.o.r.e.
"Well," she said with a little deprecatory laugh, "it"s a comfort not to be alone on a desert island."
"Indeed! Can I be welcome under any circ.u.mstances?"
"Truly, Mr. Scofield, you know that you were never more welcome. It"s very kind of you."
"Any man would be glad to come to your aid. It is merely your misfortune that I happen to be the one."
"I"m not sure that I regard it as a very great misfortune. You proved in the case of that little boy that you can act very energetically."
"And get lectured for my intemperate zeal. Well, Miss Madison, I cannot make a very pleasing spectacle with blackamoor legs, and it"s time I put my superfluous energy to some use. Suppose you get in your boat, and I"ll try to push it off."
She complied with a troubled look in her face. He pushed till the veins knotted on his forehead. At this she sprang out, exclaiming, "You"ll burst a blood-vessel."
"That"s only a phase of a ruptured heart, and you are used to such phenomena."
"It"s too bad for you to talk in that way," she cried.
"It certainly is. I will now attend strictly to business."
"I don"t see what you can do."
"Carry you out to my boat--that is all I can do."
"Oh, Mr. Scofield!"
"Can you suggest anything else?"
She looked dubiously at the intervening black mud, and was silent.
"I could go up to the hotel and bring Mr. Merriweather and Mr. Hackley."
She turned away to hide her tears.
"Or I could go after a brawny boatman; but delay is serious, for the tide is running out fast and the stretch of mud growing wider. Can you not imagine me Mike or Tim, or some fellow of that sort."
"No, I can"t."
"Then perhaps you wish me to go for Mike or Tim?"
"But the tide is running out so fast, you said."
"Yes, and it will soon be dark."
"Oh, dear!" and there was distress in her tones.
He now said kindly, "Miss Madison, I wish that like Sir Walter Raleigh I had a mantle large enough for you to walk over. You can at least imagine that I am a gentleman, that you may soon be at the hotel, and no one ever be any the wiser that you had to choose between me and the deep--ah, well--mud."
"There is no reason for such an allusion, Mr. Scofield."
"Well, then, that you had no other choice."
"That"s better. But how in the world can you manage it?"
"You will have to put your arm around my neck."
"Oh!"
"You would put your arm around a post, wouldn"t you?" he asked with more than his old brusqueness.
"Yes-s; but--"
"But the tide is going out. My own boat will soon be fast. Dinner will grow cold at the hotel, and you are only the longer in dispensing with me. You must consider the other dire alternatives."
"Ob, I forgot that you were in danger of losing a warm dinner."
"You know I have lost too much to think of that or much else. But there is no need of satire, Miss Madison. I will do whatever you wish. That truly is carte blanche enough even for this occasion."
"I didn"t mean to be satirical. I--I--Well, have your own way."
"Not if you prefer some other way."
"You have shown that practically there isn"t any other way. I"m sorry that my misfortune, or fault rather, should also be your misfortune.
You don"t know how heavy--"
"I soon will, and you must endure it all with such grace as you can.
Put your arm round my neck, so--oh, that will never do! Well, you"ll hold tight enough when I"m floundering in the mud."
Without further ado he picked her up, and started rapidly for his boat.
Stepping on a smooth stone he nearly fell, and her arm did tighten decidedly.
"If you try to go so fast," she said, "you will fall."
"I was only seeking to shorten your ordeal, but for obvious reasons must go slowly;" and he began feeling his way.