"I! I'll find the way? How?"
"I don't know—only you must. There must be some way of signalling the mainland, some means of communication. Surely people wouldn't live here, cut off from all the World.... Perhaps we'll find something in the farm-house to tell us what to do. I didn't have much time to look round. I wanted clothing, mostly—and found these awful things hanging behind the kitchen door. And then I wanted something to eat, and I found that—some bread, not too stale, and plenty of eggs in the hen-house.... And you—you must be famished!"
The reminder had an effect singularly distressing. Till then he had been much too thunderstruck by comprehension of their anomalous plight to think of himself. Now suddenly he was stabbed through and through with pangs of desperate hunger. He turned a little faint, was seized with a slight sensation of giddiness, at the thought of food, so that he was glad of the cat-boat for support.
"Oh, you are!" Compassion thrilled her tone. "I'm so sorry. Forgive me for not thinking of it at once. Come—if you can walk." She caught his hand as if to help him onward. "It's not far, and I can fix you something quickly. Do come."
"Oh, surely," he assented, recovering. "I am half starving—and then some. Only I didn't know it until you mentioned the fact."
The girl relinquished his hand, but they were almost shoulder to shoulder as they plodded through the dry, yielding sand toward firmer ground.
"We can build a fire and have something hot," she said; "there's plenty of fuel."
"But—what did you do?"
"I—oh, I took my eggs au naturel—barring some salt and pepper. I was in too much of a hurry to bother with a stove—"
"Why in a hurry?"