We walked back side by side along the river-path, very silently, for the most part, yet more than once I caught her regarding me covertly and with a puzzled air.
"Well?" I said at last, tentatively.
"I was wondering why you did it, Dick? Oh, it was mean! cruel! wicked! How could you?"
"Oh, well"—and I shrugged my shoulders, anathematising the Imp mentally the while.
"If I hadn't noticed that the rope was freshly cut, I should have thought it an accident," she went on.
"Naturally!" I said.
"And then, again, how came you in the boat?"
"To be sure!" I nodded.
"Still, I can scarcely believe that you would willfully jeopardise both our lives—my life!"
"A man who would do such a thing," I exclaimed, carried away by the heat of the moment, "would be a—a—"