"Yes, sir." That answer had been slow in coming; when it did her voice had subtly changed, softened. "The Captain is sailing today, Mr. Coree. Did you not know it?" "The--_Artemis_--is sailing?" Not relief. Something dull, heavy, unreal, as if friendly trustworthy Molly had swung her rump about and let him have her heels; presently, when he could scramble up from the ground, the pain would start. He felt prepared--maybe this was the pain beginning--quite prepared to be savagely angry with the little brown slave if he discovered that she was amused at his ignorance of the sailing. Let her laugh, just once, or merely smile, with that cool superior wisdom---- She did not. He had known all along that she would do nothing of the sort; had known also that he would not have been angry if she had, seeing it was no fault of hers that part of the world had fallen down. The look in her brown face--widening of brown eyes, slight parting of friendly lips--not pity, surely? Why should the slave pity him? Yet Ben's mother had worn that look at times--when Ru cut his finger trying to prove he could whittle with the knife in his left hand; when, on a certain evening, Father had spoken of the French butchery at Schenectady.... "Sir, you must have ridden hard--I see your horse is a-sweat. Will you not come in and rest a moment?" "_Artemis_, sailing today.... I dare say I have no occasion now to--to go----" "Sir, come inside. I'll fetch you a drop of brandy, isn't it? I think you rode too hard, and the day that warm it might be June." She touched his arm lightly, almost commandingly. Ben stepped into the cool entry, and she closed the door. "Come into the parlor. I won't be a moment. Do sit down, sir, and be at ease." Ben sat down, his eyes avoiding the stern, badly stitched sampler on the wall, seeking instead the graceful model of a full-rigged ship on the mantel. He had been about to get up for a better look at that model, he recalled, when Charity and Sultan ambushed him. Clarissa spread open the drapes at the window, startling him; he had thought that in her noiseless slippers she had already left the room. He said clumsily: "I remember you did that when I was here before." On her way out of the room she looked down at him--not smiling, he was sure, though the light shone strong behind her face and he could not see her very well. "Yes," she said thoughtfully, and was gone, and Ben turned to the model, finding in this better light the name painted on the side: HERA. Then this was she that went down off the Cape in a fog, seven years ago--not a man lost.