"You can rest here in absolute safety, madame," he said. "Permit me to arrange a seat. Then I shall bring you some wine."
Iris flung off the hand which held her arm so persuasively.
"Please do not attend to me. There are wounded men who need attention far more than I," she said, speaking in English, since it never entered her mind that the Portuguese officer had been addressing her in French.
He was puzzled more by her action than her words, but Hozier, who had followed close behind, explained in sentences built on the Ollendorffian plan that mademoiselle was disturbed, mademoiselle required rest, mademoiselle hardly understood that which had arrived, et voilá tout.
The other man smiled comprehension, though he scanned Hozier with a quick underlook.
"Is monsieur the captain?" he asked.
"No, monsieur the captain comes now. Here he is."
"Mademoiselle, without doubt, is the daughter of monsieur the captain?"
"No," said Hozier, rather curtly, turning to ascertain how Iris had disposed of herself in the interior of the cavern. It was his first experience of a South American dandy's pose towards women, or, to be exact, toward women who are young and pretty, and it seemed to him not the least marvelous event of an hour crammed with marvels that any man should endeavor to begin an active flirtation under such circumstances.
He saw that Iris was seated on a camp stool. Her face was buried in her hands. A wealth of brown hair was tumbled over her neck and shoulders; the constant showers of spray had loosened her tresses, and the unavoidable rigors of the passage from ship to ledge had shaken out every hairpin. The Tam o' Shanter cap she was wearing early in the day had disappeared at some unknown stage of the adventure. Her attitude bespoke a mood of overwhelming dejection. Like the remainder of her companions in misfortune, she was drenched to the skin. That physical drawback, however, was only a minor evil in this almost unpleasantly hot retreat; but Hozier, able now to focus matters in fairly accurate proportion, felt that Iris had not yet plumbed the depths of suffering. Their trials were far from ended when their feet rested on the solid rock. There was every indication that their rescuers were refugees like themselves. The scanty resources visible in the cave, the intense anxiety of the elderly Portuguese to avoid observation from the chief island of the group, the very nature of the apparently inaccessible crag in which he and his associates were hiding—each and all of these things spoke volumes.