he would have said, but she could sing. He came to a
final stop only a few yards away, and watched her through the leaves
with burning eyes. She was in her favourite attitude, sitting on her
heels, her strong young back curving in to her swaying waist.

Her hair, all unbound, fell around her in shifting masses like smoke.
While she sang she combed it with long strokes, holding her head now
on this side, now on that, and ever revealing a lovelier pose of her
round arms. The half light lent her an unearthly beauty.

The sight was no less affecting than the sound. A great pain filled
Sam's breast, and the old inward struggle dragged him back and forth.
She was at once so desirable and so hateful in his eyes. It was the
cry of bewildered youth: "What right has anything so bad to be
beautiful!"

No doubt of her badness occurred to him. Had she not ruined his
chances in that country? The old antagonism was there, the readiness
to believe ill of the other sex that is born of mutual fear. She had
become the immemorial siren in Sam's eyes, and he was fighting to save
his soul. But she was beautiful enough to make a man wish to be
damned.

She came to the end of her song, and presently started another, a more
rollicking air, but still charged with wistfulness. Who had taught her
those hushed, thrilling tones? Sam recognized this air, too, and
thought of the mother who had sung it to him years ago.

It was "Twickenham Ferry." Why that of all songs? he wondered
rebelliously. It was not fair that she should be armed thus to seek
out the weakest joints in his armour.

The desire to stop the song with his own mouth became more than he
could bear. The struggle was almost over when she paused and bent her
head to listen, and looked up and down the beach.

It broke the spell.

"She's just trying to bring you to her!" Sam told himself, aghast.
"That's why her hair is down and all. And you're falling for it, you
fool!"

He turned and fled back around the beach.

Whether or not she heard him run away, the song presently ceased, and
troubled him no more that night. He returned to his blankets, but not
to sleep again.

He built a fire and lay beside it smoking. He drove away the
recollection of the disturbing loveliness he had seen by counting over
his injuries at her hands, nourishing them and magnifying them in his
mind until they filled it to the exclusion of everything else.

It became as dark as it would get. Midnight at