She must exercise patience and wait a little longer. What should she do if the young man did not arrive before the lapse of half an hour? this was a contingency for which she must be prepared. Her aunt Zerah had bidden her remain till Pooke appeared. But if he did not appear before the tide was out, then she would be unable to cross that evening. It would be eminently unsatisfactory to be benighted, and to have to seek shelter on the Bishop’s Teignton side. She had no friends there, and to be rambling about with Pooke in quest of some place where both might be accommodated was what she could not think of. To await the turn of the tide in her boat was a prospect only slightly less agreeable. The wind was from the east, it cut like a knife. She was ill provided for exposure to it in the night. The sun had set and the light was ebbing out of the sky as fast as the water was draining out of the estuary. There was no moon. There would be little starlight, for the clouds as they advanced became compacted into a leaden canopy that obscured the constellations. Kate looked across the water to Coombe Cellars. Already a light had been kindled there, and from the window it formed a glittering line on the running tide. She gazed wistfully down the river. All was dark there. She could hear the murmur of the sea behind the Den, a bar of shingle and sand that more than half closed the mouth of the river. Kate leaned over the side of the boat. The water gulped and curled away; in a quarter of an hour it would be gone. She thrust her boat farther out, as already it was being left high and dry. She would allow Pooke five minutes longer, ten minutes at the outside; yet she had no watch by which to measure the time. She shrank from being benighted on that side of the river. She shrank from the alternative of a scolding from her aunt should she come across without Pooke. What if John Pooke were to arrive at the landing-place one minute after she had departed? What if she waited for John Pooke one minute over the moment at which it was possible to cross? Whilst thus tossed in doubt, the train glided by. There were lights in the carriages, a strong light in the driving carriage cast forward along the rails. The train did not travel fast--at a rate not above thirty miles an hour. Kate heaved a sigh. “At last! Pooke will be here directly. Oh dear! I hope not too late.” The atmospheric train slipped away into darkness with very little noise, and then the only sound Kate heard was that of the lapping of the water against the sides of the boat, like that produced by a dog drinking. CHAPTER V ON A MUD-BANK “Halloa! Ferry, ho!” “Here you are, sir.” “Who is that singing out?” “It is I--Kate Quarm.” “What--Kitty Alone? Is that what is to be? Over the water together--Kitty Alone and I?”