"Quite impossible, my dear girl," answered I hastily, beginning at last to have some faint suspicion of what was in this savage beauty's unsophisticated mind. "I owe a duty to my King; and that duty imperatively demands that I shall return at once to the ship in which I am serving him--and where, Ama, I may mention, no place could possibly be found for you. But I do not forget that you have saved my life, Ama; and therefore, come what will, I will not leave you until you have formed some definite plan for your own safety and happiness. What did you think of doing when the time comes for us to part?" The girl was silent so long that I was obliged to repeat my question before I could get an answer, and when at length she replied, I feared I could detect tears in her voice, and could have execrated myself for a stony-hearted wretch. "I have never looked so far forward as that," she answered in quavering tones; "but we need not think of that yet, Dick. When the time comes I have no doubt that I shall know what to do. And now, we really _must_ cease talking, and push on as fast as we can, or we shall not reach our place of concealment before the dawn comes to reveal our whereabouts to our pursuers." I was not sorry to have the conversation closed, for I wanted a little time for reflection. It was clear to me that this unsophisticated young savage had been dominated in her actions by one idea alone, that of saving me from a death of unspeakable horror; she knew that, in so doing, she was cutting herself off for ever from her own people, to whom it would be impossible for her to return; and, in her absolute simplicity, she had evidently thought that it would be the easiest thing in the world for her to throw in her lot with mine. How was I to undeceive her; how make her understand the absolute impossibility of such a thing? I greatly feared that to convince her of this would be wholly beyond my power. Yet what was to become of her? I could not abandon her, alone and unprotected, to her fate; nor could I take her with me. The problem seemed absolutely insoluble; and at length I came to the conclusion that the only thing to be done was to leave the issue to destiny.