The broad lagoon, rippling in the moonlight, lay before them; the night was so still that they heard the dip of the oars long before they saw the boat itself; Patricio, opposite, looked like a country in a dream. The giant limbs of the live-oak under which they stood rose high in the air above them, and then drooped down again far forward, the dark shade beneath concealing them perfectly, in spite of Margaret's white robe. Now the boat shot into sight. Its sail was up, white as silver, but as there was no wind, Lucian was rowing. It was a small, light boat, almost too small for the great silver sail; but that was what Lucian liked. He kept on his course far out in the stream; he was bound for the mouth of the harbor.
Garda gave a long sigh. "I ought to be there!" she murmured. "Oh, I ought to be there!" She stood motionless, watching the boat come nearer, pass, and disappear; then she turned and looked at Margaret in silence.
"We can go out to-morrow evening, if you like," said Margaret, ignoring the expression of her face.
"Yes, at eight o'clock, I suppose, with Evert, and Mrs. Rosalie!"
"Would you prefer to go in the middle of the night?"
"Infinitely. And with Lucian alone."
"I should think that might be a little tiresome."
"Oh, come, don't pretend; you don't know how," said Garda, laughing. "At heart you're as serious as death about all this—you know you are. Tiresome, did you say? Just looking at him, to begin with—do you call that tiresome? And then the way he talks, the way he says things! Oh, Margaret, I give you my word I adore being amused as Lucian amuses me." She turned as she said this and met Margaret's eyes fixed upon her. "You can't understand it," she commented. "You can't understand that I prefer Lucian to Evert."
Margaret turned from her. But the next instant she came back. "There are some things I must ask you, Garda."
"Well, do stay here a little longer then, it's so lovely; we'll sit down on the bench. But perhaps you'll be chilled—you're so lightly dressed. What have you on your feet? Oh Margaret! only those thin shoes—no more than slippers?" She took her shawl, and kneeling down, wrapped it round Margaret's ankles. "What little feet you have!" she said, admiringly. "It reminds me of my wet shoes that night on the barren," she added, rising; and then, standing there with her hands clasped behind her, she appeared to be meditating. "Now that time I was in earnest too!" she said, with a sort of wonder at herself.