“What did he say?”
“Nothing. I sent him down aboard the schooner at once. He ought to be out of the river by this time.” “Maurice, I have a strange feeling about that man.”
“Eh?” said Maurice.
“I seem to fear him, as if I knew some story about him, and yet didn't know it.”
“That's not very clear,” said Maurice, forcing a laugh, “but don't let's talk about him any more. We'll soon be far from Port Arthur and everybody in it.”
“Maurice,” said she, caressingly, “I love you, dear. You'll always protect me against these men, won't you?”
Maurice kissed her. “You have not got over your fright, Sylvia,” he said. “I see I shall have to take a great deal of care of my wife.”
“Of course,” replied Sylvia.
And then the pair began to make love, or, rather, Maurice made it, and Sylvia suffered him.
Suddenly her eye caught something. “What's that—there, on the ground by the fountain?” They were near the spot where Dawes had been seized the night before. A little stream ran through the garden, and a Triton—of convict manufacture—blew his horn in the middle of a—convict built—rockery. Under the lip of the fountain lay a small packet. Frere picked it up. It was made of soiled yellow cloth, and stitched evidently by a man's fingers. “It looks like a needle-case,” said he.