s to take her away, she was like a woman walking alone in the midst of
perils and enemies, towards a shining destiny, her delicate body
sheathed in the supple and impenetrable armour of an inherited
fortitude. She smiled.

"Everything," she murmured in French. "Have I not thee?" And she added,
so that his face cleared of doubt and he, too, smiled proudly: "Ah, yes.
What do we need, if we have each other?" He strained her suddenly to him
and she stood there looking up at him with her bright, fearless, amber
eyes smiling. She said:

"The boat?"

They reached the corner and for an instant the dark unfamiliarity of the
lane daunted her.

"Down here, dear," he said, holding her close. "I have a man I can trust
in the boat. He's waiting."

They advanced silently, turning the corners of the lane and stooping
beneath the boughs of the sycamores. Her faint adumbration of doubt
inspired in him an emotion of fiery protectiveness. For a moment, while
they were among the trees in the garden, they halted and stood close
together. The door swung open, letting out a long shaft of yellow light
for an instant, showing up in sharp silhouette a chair, a table, some
garbage, and a startled cat. And closed again with a bang and a rattle
that mingled with the steps of someone going off up the lane.

"What is this place?" she whispered, looking up into the sky for the
outline of the roof. "Ah, yes!" she said, noting the bulging cupola on
the tower. "I see."

"You know about this place?" he asked as they reached the low parapet at
the bottom of the garden. She pressed his arm in assent. She did. Women
always know those facts of local history. Evanthia recalled, looking out
over the obscure and shadowy waters of the Gulf, the tale of that old
votary of pleasure. Men were like that. Behind her infatuation for the
gay young person supposed to be in Athens, she cherished a profound
animosity towards men. She stood there, a man's arm flung tensely about
her, another man cautiously working the boat in beneath where she stood,
the blood and tissues of her body nourished by the exertions of other
men, meditating intently upon the swinish proclivities of men. She even
trembled slightly at the thought of those proclivities, and the man
beside her held her more closely and soothed her with a gentle caress
because he imagined she was the victim of a woman's timidity.

"It's all right, dear," he murmured. "Now I'll get down." He stooped and
cautio