She sprang to her feet, faced about; and Crusoe was not more agitated when he saw the print of the naked foot on his island's strand. The straw hat with the flapping brim was just lifting above the edge of the rock at the opposite side, where the path was. She could not escape; the shelf offered no hiding place. Now the young man was stepping to the level, panting loudly.
"Gee, what a climb for a hot day!" he cried. "Where are you?"
With that he was looking at Susan, less than twenty yards away and drawn up defiantly. He stared, took off his hat. He had close-cropped wavy hair and eyes as gray as Susan's own, but it was a blue-gray instead of violet. His skin was fair, too, and his expression intelligent and sympathetic. In spite of his hat, and his blue cotton shirt, and trousers rolled high on bare sunburned legs, there was nothing of the yokel about him.
"I beg your pardon," he exclaimed half humorously. "I thought it was my cousin Nell."
"No," said Susan, disarmed by his courtesy and by the frank engaging manner of it.
"I didn't mean to intrude." He showed white teeth in a broad smile. "I see from your face that this is your private domain."
"Oh, no—not at all," stammered Susan.
"Yes, I insist," replied he. "Will you let me stay and rest a minute? I ran round the rock and climbed pretty fast."
"Yes—do," said Susan.
The young man sat on the grass near where he had appeared, and crossed his long legs. The girl, much embarrassed, looked uneasily about. "Perhaps you'd sit, too?" suggested he, after eyeing her in a friendly way that could not cause offense and somehow did not cause any great uneasiness.