She cried out in protest; she clung to him.
"No!" she cried. "No!"
Very gently, very firmly, her hand was drawn aside. He bent over her; something touched faintly—very faintly—her lips. The next instant she was alone. He had leaped—far out into the grip of the tide.
She caught her breath and clutched the rope; she flung herself down and wedged her limbs behind a boulder. Fate was relentless, she told herself, was cruel beyond even her darkest anticipations. For now her one support was to be denied her; she was to be left alone. She set her lips grimly. No, she would never see Aylmer again, but she would defy Fate! She was to be crushed, but she would go down fighting; she would be worthy of herself—and of him.
The vagrant shaft of moonlight was gone again; the darkness was well-nigh impenetrable. The rope swung between her fingers unstraining. The minutes passed one by one; the tension of expectancy plucked at her nerves; she shivered, but not with cold. Even if it was the worst that was to come upon her she wanted to know—to know.
The rope grew taut.
It was as if an electric shock thrilled her. She braced herself against the stone, and her muscles tightened; slowly, using her strength to its utmost but with steady effort, she began to haul it in foot by foot. It came heavily but unceasingly, the coils unwinding fathom after fathom at her side.
And then the strain ceased as suddenly as it had begun. A voice hailed her out of the darkness, almost at her feet. A dark bulk rose at the breakwater's edge.
Aylmer staggered towards her and laid something on the stones—something which stirred uneasily but unavailingly, clogged, as it seemed, by the weight of its sodden clothing.
She knelt beside it. She brushed the lank hair from a dripping face.