"Oh, is that what you came out for?" Adrian retorted, with something like exasperation. "Well, you jolly nearly were dead. As you say you wish to be, I suppose you wouldn’t have minded, but you seem to forget that you’ve risked our lives too--let alone the fearful anxiety to my mother, and----" "Don’t, Addie," urged Crow; "what’s the good--we’ll settle all that afterwards. The point is, where’s Pam?" Then speaking directly to the girl she asked: "Where is Pamela, my sister?" "Oh, quite safe--on land--in the Crown Hill wood, I expect." "How do you know?" suspiciously. "I asked her to meet me. To come at half-past five. I asked her particularly." "Why?" asked Adrian. There was silence; the girl looked sullen; her eyes seemed sunken almost, so deep were the shadows round them. "Why?" demanded Adrian again. "What was your object? If you wanted to borrow our dinghy why didn’t you come and ask for it--not that we should have let you have it this weather," he added _sotto voce_, in an Adrian-like aside. "Don’t ask any more till she’s had something to eat and drink," said Crow. "Here, take off your coat; you’re awfully wet." She pulled the coat off with a firm hand. There, fastening the silk blouse in front, was the diamond safety-pin. The light made it glitter with a hundred tiny rays. "_Addie_!" exclaimed Crow. "Well, it is my own," said the girl. "Just so. We are beginning to see light--at least _I_ am," retorted Adrian stiffly. "You’ve been posing as my sister Pamela, haven’t you? Was it you who went to Miss Ashington and asked for that brooch?" "It is _mine_!" flamed the girl. "Cannot I have my own?" Adrian shrugged his shoulders. "You don’t seem to see that there are two ways of getting one’s own," he said, "a decent way--and, well--a rotten one. Did you by any chance happen to let out Badger’s sheep and his horses, and come along to the cliff above Champles cove the other day?" "How can I tell? Perhaps I did. I think you are rude and unkind," said the girl in an aggrieved voice. "Great Scot!" ejaculated Adrian. "Well, of all the extraordinary females----" Christobel was putting food on the table while this curious conversation took place. She now interrupted it by ordering this surprising visitor to eat, which she did, heartily and hungrily. Afterwards Crow ordained that she was to take off her skirt, shoes, and stockings, and they could be dried at the stove. "You can roll up in a blanket," she said, "and stay where you are; you’ll soon be warm all through down here. Adrian and I have got to get home now." "I don’t want to go home," said the girl, untying her shoes. "Why not?" "I am not happy. If I go back I shall be very uncomfortable." "It looks as though you thought of no one but yourself," said Crow. "I dare say you don’t _mean_ it, but it sounds so."