e, fearing that she might fall over backward into the
sea--but let that pass.... I don't know whether or not Kemper could
distinguish anything aboard our boat. He craned his head enough to twist
it off his neck.

To be so utterly, so blindly devoted to science is a great safeguard for
a man. Single-mindedness, however, need not induce atrophy of every
humane impulse. I drew the pretty waitress closer--not that the night was
cold, but it might become so. Changes in the tropics come swiftly. It is
well to be prepared.

Her cheek felt very soft against my shoulder. There seemed to be a faint
perfume about her hair. It really was odd how subtly fragrant she seemed
to be--almost, perhaps, a matter of scientific interest.

Her hands did not seem to be chilled; they did seem unusually smooth and
soft.

I said to her: "When at home, I suppose your mother tucks you in; doesn't
she?"

"Yes," she nodded sleepily.

"And what does she do then?" said I, with something of that ponderous
playfulness with which I make scientific jokes at a meeting of the Bronx
Anthropological Association, when I preside.

"She kisses me and turns out the light," said Evelyn Grey, innocently.

I don't know how much Kemper could distinguish. He kept dodging about and
twisting his head until I really thought it would come off, unless it had
been screwed on like the top of a piano stool.

A few minutes later he fired his pistol twice; and Evelyn sat up. I never
knew why he fired; he never offered any explanation.

Toward midnight I could hear the roar of breakers on our starboard bow.
Evelyn heard them, too, and sat up inquiringly.

"Grue has found the inlet to Black Bayou, I suppose," said I.

And it proved to be the case, for, with the surf thundering on either
hand, we sailed into a smoothly flowing inlet through which the flood
tide was running between high dunes all sparkling in the moonlight and
crowned with shadowy palms.

Occasionally I heard noises ahead of us from the other boat, as though
Kemper was trying to converse with us, but as his apropos was as
unintelligible as it was inopportune, I pretended not to hear him.
Besides, I had all I could do to manoeuvre the tiller and prevent Evelyn
Grey from falling off backward into the bayou. Besides, it is not
customary to converse with the man at the helm.

After a while--during which I seemed to distinguish in Kemper's voice a
quality that rhymes with his name--his tones varied throu