Kitty put her lips to his ear. "What are you going to do?" she whispered, apprehending the worst.
"Warn Nahnya," he returned. "In two hours it will be light."
"You can't!" she began, with rising excitement. "You're not fit to——"
Ralph clapped his good hand over her mouth.
"How he hates me!" thought Kitty. Realizing the hopelessness of trying to dissuade him, she helped push the raft off the sand. Ralph climbed on board, and Kitty followed.
"Go back!" he whispered sharply.
For answer she took the paddle out of his hand and shoved the raft into deeper water. "You can't travel alone," she whispered. "You can't use the paddle. You'd only be carried down the rapids."
He made no further objection. Kitty propelled the raft into the main current, and laid the paddle down.
Thereafter they travelled without speaking. The raft was ceaselessly and slowly swung around and back in the eddies. The shadowy mountain masses crouched and looked dumbly up at the stars like gross, earthy creatures under the spell of fairy wands. There was no air stirring, and the river was like oil stirred with a spoon. Occasionally the eddies burst beside them with a soft gush, immediately to reform again.
Though there was but an arm's length between them, the two on the raft were separated by a wall more impenetrable than stones and mortar. On one side of it sat the youth with his hooded despair; on the other side the girl nursed her unrequited love, and her torturing jealousy. Her quick mind ran ahead to picture the meeting with the other woman that she must witness. She knew that Nahnya loved Ralph, however she might repulse him. It was she, Kitty, who was the scorned outsider. Yet of the two the youth was the worse off, for under cover of the darkness she might weep and ease her heart.