Above them the sky, clear as ever; below them the sea, bright, pellucid; but between them a gathering curtain which even as he looked faded from gold to white, from white to grey, as the unseen sun sank beneath the unseen horizon.
"It is a sea-haugh," he said lightly; "the wind must have changed to the north, and the cold condenses the vapour. I have seen them often after hot weather. But it is all right. We must be close to the yacht, for we were well in the current when I stopped rowing; and it runs inshore due south. If I whistle, they must hear and answer."
But none came, and the sound seemed to return resonant from the mist, showing that it had not travelled far. So, whistling, shouting, and rowing, they spent some time in vain, till fear began to invade her courage. What if they had drifted past? What if they were drifting out to sea, further and further from safety? He tried to scoff at her alarm, though his own anxiety grew fast as the mist settled thicker and thicker till he could not see a yard beyond the bows. Suddenly, with a grating shock, the boat stopped abruptly, almost throwing them into each other's arms. His heart seemed to stop also, as he remembered having heard of sunken rocks in mid channel.
"We are aground--stay still, I will see."
He stepped cautiously over the side, one foot into six inches of water and a shelving bottom, the other into three. Then on to firm dry warm sand. His laugh of relief was genuine.
"The adventure is over, Maud. Come! let me help you out. This must be the mainland; but where, I can't say."
A difficult question, indeed, to decide with that grey mist curtain closing in and shutting out all, save a patch or two of bent at their feet.
"Stay here a bit," he continued, "and I will explore. Take the whistle. I won't go beyond its reach or be away long; the road must be close by."
It was not, however, and he returned after a time with a clouded face. "I don't understand it. The sea seems to surround us except in one direction, and that is all sand and bent. I don't remember any such point below Grâda."
"Perhaps we are above it," suggested his companion.