When they had become but specks on the dim water, I doffed my clothes, took my knife between my teeth, and swam across to the sand-spit. There was a low moon, obscured by thin and slowly drifting clouds, and as I swam through the faint trail of it, Marc must have seen me coming. Nevertheless he gave no sign, and I could see that his head drooped forward upon his breast. An awful fear came down upon me, and for a second or two I was like to sink, so numb I turned at the thought that perchance the savages had put the knife to him before quitting. I recovered, however, as I called to mind the orders which Tamin had rehearsed to me ere starting on his venture; for I knew how sorely the Black Abbe was feared by his savage flock. What they deemed him to have commanded, that would they do. Drawing closer now, I felt the ground beneath my feet. "Marc," I called softly, "I'm coming, lad!" The drooped head was lifted. "Father!" he exclaimed. And there was something like a sob in that cry of joy. It caught my heart strangely, telling me he was still a boy for all he had borne himself so manfully in the face of sudden and appalling peril. Now the long tension was loosed. He was alone with me. As I sprang to him and cut the thongs that held him, one arm went about my neck and I was held very close for the space of some few heart-beats. Then he fetched a deep breath, stretched his cramped limbs this way and that, and said simply, "I knew you would come, Father! I knew you would find a way!" Chapter IV The Governor's Signature The clouds slipped clear of the moon's face, and we three--Marc, I, and the stake--cast sudden long black shadows which led all the way down to the edge of the increeping tide. I looked at the shadows, and a shudder passed through me as if a cold hand had been laid upon my back. Marc stood off a little,--never have I seen such quick control, such composure, in one so inexperienced,--and remarked to me:-- "What a figure of a man you are, Father, to be sure!" I fell into his pretence of lightness at once, a high relief after the long and deadly strain; and I laughed with some pleasure at the praise. In very truth, I cherished a secret pride in my body. "'Tis well enough, no doubt, in a dim light," said I, "though by now surely somewhat battered!" Marc was already taking off his clothes. As he knotted them into a convenient bundle, there came from the woods, a little way back of the point, the hollow "Too-hoo-hoo-whoo-oo!" of the small gray owl. "There's Tamin!" said I, and was on the point of answering in like fashion, when the cry was reiterated twice.