"I may have to. You need not. I will go out to the pile and make a raft, and take you across on it. And all that will take time, so the sooner we're off the better."
They paddled across to the spit and hurried along to the point, as nondescript a pair as could well be imagined in disrespect of clothing, but in all else that mattered—in all the great essentials that make for vigorous life—in health, good looks, and high and cheerful spirit—pre-eminently good to look upon.
For work on the wreck-pile the less one wore the better; and so he was clad in one simple but sufficient garment, which consisted of a long strip of linen wound many times round his waist and falling to the knees like a South Sea Island kilt. And she wore one of the prehistoric woman's sarks which Macro had brought over from the pile, and a similar, but slightly longer, kilt which swung gracefully a foot or so above her ankles as she walked.
He carried an axe in his hand, and had a knife at his back, in a seaman's belt which he had unhooked from its owner's body out there on the pile one day; and his face was somewhat grave and intent, since he was considering the possibilities of Macro's violent rejection of the situation he had himself created, and the consequences that would then ensue. But her bright face was all alive with the spirit of adventure and the novelty of this new departure.
"We look like Adam and Eve turned out of Paradise, and setting out to conquer the world," she laughed excitedly. "What would your friends think if they saw you so?"
"What they thought wouldn't trouble me in the slightest. If they understood they would understand. If they didn't it would not matter. We are doing what has to be done in the only way to do it. See the birds out there!"
"Are those really all birds? I thought it was a cloud whirling about," and she stood and stared in amazement.
"Listen and you'll hear them,"—and every now and again the south-west breeze brought them the thin strident wailing of the hungry myriads as they swooped and fought for their living.
"They sound horrid," said The Girl, with a sudden shadow on her face. "It is like the wailing of lost souls, as he said. Do they never attack you?"
"We have had more than one fight with them. But you can always escape by slipping down into a crack or jumping into the sea. Where did you learn to swim?"