The girl shuddered.
“Peace, prithee,” she said. “I do not like to hear you jest so. Oh, that he had died with my father.”
“Marry, sweetheart, fie upon thee speaking of thy grandsire so,” Hal laughed merrily.
The girl looked about her uneasily.
“Hush!” she said. “I would not have him hear us.”
The boy’s laugh rang out again and he bent as he kissed her, although her height was unusual in the island, for he was very tall.
“Look, Anny, lass,” he said laughingly. “See how far we are from the Pet,” and he pointed ahead of them to where an old mastless hull lay moored in a little bay about a quarter of a mile from where they stood.
Anny glanced up at him and he stopped to look at her. Although they had lived in the same house since they could remember, he was never tired of gazing at that wonderful face of hers, and praising it till it reddened to the colour of the rough canvas shirt to which he pressed it.
It was plump and oval in shape, white, but delicately touched with a colour in the cheeks, and her hair, of that intense blackness which seems to absorb the light, curled over her low forehead. But her eyes were wonderful. Of a deep sea-green, they caught light and shadow from her surroundings. The girl was certainly a beauty and of no common type.
Hal caught his breath.