'The woman he had hoped to win?' Well!--he scarce dared whisper the thought to his longing heart, yet it was there!--the thought, the hope that in days to come, in after-months, perhaps years, when her grief for Gilbert Bampfyld was mellowed and softened by time, when she knew him better and should fully recognise how profound his adoration for her was, he might still win her! She could not, young as she was, and with all the years of a long life before her, sorrow for ever--sorrow for a memory that would at last be nothing but a shadow. 'He _would_ win her!' he said aloud to himself now, as he worked the boat ashore, 'he was resolved he would.' The one obstacle in his path was removed, the brave, gallant young officer was gone, brushed aside by Fate. He would win her yet! He stepped ashore now to where she was standing watching him, and it seemed almost--if his recent thoughts had not tinged his present fancies with a roseate hue--that there was a look of greeting and welcome to him in her eyes, even as she saw that he had come back--even at the ending of so short an absence as his had been! Was she beginning now--now that she had none other in the world to watch for--to desire to have him always near her? Ah, if that were indeed so! Then--then he might win her at last. 'You found,' she asked, speaking low, and in those sad tones which had come into her voice of late, and since disaster had fallen heavily on them, 'you found no sign of any others having been saved?' 'No,' he said, also softly. 'No, there are no signs of that. Miss Waldron--I am neither cruel nor hard of heart, but--oh, how can I say it!--it is useless to hope.' 'Useless! Ah, well, I suppose it is--it must be! And, God help me, it must also be borne.' Then she turned away from him with the desire to prevent the tears which had risen to her eyes from being seen by him, and went back to the shade of the trees under which she had been sitting until she saw the quarter-boat returning with him in it. And he followed her, carrying the cable which he brought away from the ship; the knife which he had found being in his pocket and the sail with its gear left in the boat. The sun was terribly fierce now, so fierce that to be beneath its rays for only a few moments was to risk sunstroke or to be burnt more red than he had long since been, or she since her exposure on the island; and, of course, he could not attempt the projected tour of the place until that sun once more sank low in the west. There was, therefore, nothing now to do but to sit idly gazing out to sea and watch for signs of any ship which might pass near enough to perceive them, when they should have erected signals.