Marlowe turned. “Thank God!” he said, “you are saved. Speak to him.” And, with all the relief in the poet’s voice, there was a note of pain; for he had read her eyes. “Captain Vytal.” The soldier stirred as though in an abyss of sleep, his breast heaving slightly. “John Vytal.” The name was spoken in a low voice, yet, far away in the world that sound and sight fathom not by utterance or gaze, but only by their meaning, one spirit was calling to another. The captain opened his eyes slowly. “Thanks be to Heaven!” And Marlowe turned to Eleanor. “Your salvation is his as well.” Vytal’s lips parted. “Salvation? What mean you by salvation?” He forced himself to sit upright, and his voice rose harsh as a night wind. “Has Mistress Dare been nigh to danger?” Neither Marlowe nor Eleanor made answer, but Gyll Croyden, who now had joined the group, replied, laughing: “Ay, that have we both. Master Ralph Contempt and Towaye snared us cunningly, but a wench’s wit outdid them, and, alas! a wench’s hair.” She stroked her close-cut curls dolefully. Vytal staggered to his feet, and, facing Marlowe, questioned him like a judge of the Inquisition: “Wherefore didst thou not make this known to me?” The poet met his gaze unflinchingly. “I thought—” “Thought!” The word was repeated in a frigid, biting tone. “Thought! ’Twas not your right to think. The daughter of our governor was in jeopardy.” “Yes, captain, and our colony also. I deemed it advisable not to pit one duty against another. On coming ashore after the battle I would have told you, but you had swooned.” Vytal looked at him in silence; then, finally sinking down again to a sitting posture, “You were right, Kyt,” and his eyes met Eleanor’s—“’Twas for our colony.” “I pray you rest,” she said. “Your strength is spent.” But he sat bolt-upright and made as if to rebuckle his sword-belt in a dazed, automatic way. “Nay, madam; it is unimpaired.” * * * * * At about this time a solitary man, far to the southward, struck inland from the shore. It was Frazer, returning from a defeat to what he believed was to be the scene of a conquest which should retrieve it.