"That's all right, sir."
The next moment he was half-way up the path. If he had looked back, he would have beheld the singular and doubtless pleasing spectacle of the Mermaid and myself doing the real Argentine tango along the stretch of yellow sand.
She did not see the blood on my hand for a minute or two. Then:
"My dear lad, what have you done to your hand?"
"Cut on the rocks," I said laconically. "Nothing of any consequence, I assure you. I shall be able to proceed home."
"After attention. Let me look at it."
And so it came about that, when the boots returned, my left hand was bound up with a strip of chemise, and the bandage was tied with the pale-pink ribbon that had lately lain upon the Mermaid's shoulder.
We received him delightedly. The Mermaid's garments had been placed by the thoughtful chambermaid in a little dressing-case. Mine were tied together with a piece of string, after the manner of costumes at Nathan's. But they were all right.
The girl started to dress behind a rock, and I told the fellow to wait at the foot of the path. "I have reason," I said, "reason to believe that there are others even now in the same or self-same plight as that in which you found us. Therefore remain within call. Don't investigate for yourself. This is my show. But don't go."
He promised.