"I know Devonshire well!" exclaimed Derval with growing interest.
"Do you?" she asked, while her earnest eyes dilated.
"May I ask your name?"
"Clara."
"A pretty name! Clara what?"
"Hampton. And yours?"
"Hampton too."
"How very, very odd!"
Derval laughed, as the little "situation" began to have "its charm," in one way, but not quite in another. In their hiding-place, the whole floor of which was now a stretch of deep and shining water, the sound of excited voices reached them, as from a distance, from time to time—the voices of those who, no doubt, were in search of the lost one, and with whom Derval could not communicate, for there—either brought in by the flood-tide from the sea, or by it out of the pool—he could see, at no great distance from the perch occupied by himself and his shrinking companion, the back or dorsal fin of a great shark above the surface of the smooth dead water, while the whole of its awful length was visible beneath it.
The monster swam slowly to and fro—Derval, sailor-like, never doubting but it heard their voices, and was only waiting if opportunity served, or the water rose, to make a mouthful of each of them; but he felt safe and secure, as they were above high-water mark, as he could see by the colour of the coral walls; and when, ultimately, the tide did begin to ebb, Jack Shark passed out with it, and eventually disappeared.