"Maud! Come back! It is not safe!" Still he went on. Not safe, indeed! He floundered desperately for a moment, and then stood with laboured breath and a dew of deadly fear on his face, looking round him. The sun rising steadily had, by this time, turned the mist into a golden haze, through which he could see that a few seaweed-hung boulders had been gathered to a heap whence sprang a cross-shaped post. It must be a ford--the sea ford to Eilean-a-fa-ash. That way then lay safety, for a few hours; but which way had she gone? He stooped to see, with fear for her and for himself fighting with his love. Then he stood up, pale as death. "Maud! Come back. Maud! I will not hurt you." Surely, surely there was an answering cry. The relief seemed to blind him, deafen him. "Here! Here! where are you? It is I!" The next instant Rick Halmar was beside him, fiercely imperative. "Where is she? Where is she?" Eustace Gordon looked at the eager boyish face stupidly, and faltered, "She was afraid--she ran away. I don't know why. Call her. She might come to you. Call her." Those bright blue eyes seemed to pierce him through and through, before they sought the ground. There was not much to be seen; only the print of a woman's foot in the sand, a foot going south; due south. "Coward!" The word rang out clear from the golden mist like a voice from heaven, and Eustace Gordon was left standing alone beside the cross pointing towards safety. Rick Halmar had gone south; due south. VIII Then a new cry beat itself upon the curtain of mist: "Lady Maud! Lady Maud! it is I--Rick! Rick Halmar." And the boy's voice reached further than the man's, as moment by moment the sea-haugh lightened, softened, rose, until it seemed no more than a golden halo round the climbing sun. "It is I--Rick! Rick Halmar." His hands clenched tighter and tighter as he ran. To Eustace the danger had been uncertain, unreal, but Rick knew every inch of the ground, and knew that each step left hope further behind. Already his accustomed ear had caught the curious whispering hush with which the land gives way before the sea. And he knew what that meant on Grâda Sands. Firm foothold for a second and then a shivering and murmuring sliding gulf. Oh, horrible, most horrible to think of her. "Lady Maud! it is I--Rick, only Rick."