This granite pathway is not straight; it curves a little here and there, adapting itself to the line of the shore. To-night it glittered in the moonlight. It was high tide, and the water also glittered as it came lapping against the stones waveringly, so that the granite somehow seemed to waver, too. Etheridge was last, behind Mrs. Kip. He did not wish to make her dizzy by walking beside her, he said. Suddenly he descended. On the land side. Mrs. Kip, hearing the thud of his jump, turned her head, surprised. And then the commodore (though he was still staggering) held out his hand, saying, "We get off here, of course; it is much our nearest way. That's the reason I stepped down," he carelessly added. Mrs. Kip had intended to follow the wall as far as the Basin. But she always instinctively obeyed directions given in a masculine voice. If there were two masculine voices, she obeyed the younger. In this case the younger man did not speak. She acquiesced, therefore, in the elder's sharp "Come!" For poor Etheridge had been so jarred by his fall that his voice had become for the moment falsetto. Mrs. Chase and Walter Willoughby, thus deserted, continued on their way alone. It was a beautiful night. The moon lighted the water so brilliantly that the flash of the light-house on Anastasia seemed superfluous; the dark fort loomed up in massive outlines; a narrow black boat was coming across from the island, and, as there was a breeze, the two Minorcans it carried had put up a rag of a sail, which shone like silver. "How fast they go!" said Ruth. "Would you like to sail home?" asked Walter. He did not wait for her answer, for, quick at divination, he had caught the wish in her voice. He hailed the Minorcans; they brought their boat up to the next flight of water-steps; in two minutes from the time she had first spoken, Ruth, much amused by this unexpected adventure, was sailing down the inlet. "Oh, how wet! I didn't think of that," Walter had exclaimed as he saw the water in the bottom of the boat; and with a quick movement he had divested himself of his coat, and made a seat of it for her in the driest place. She had had no time to object, they were already off; she must sit down, and sit still, for their tottlish craft was only a dugout. Walter, squatting opposite, made jocular remarks about his appearance as he sat there in his shirt-sleeves. It was never difficult for Ruth to laugh, and presently, as the water gained on her companion in spite of all his efforts, she gave way to mirth. She laughed so long that Walter began to feel that he knew her better, that he even knew her well. He laughed himself. But he also took the greatest pains at the same time to guard her pretty dress from injury.