Love burned clear, love of man and woman. It kept its heyday. But beside it rose, higher and more massive than in the peopled, busy island, other ranges of the mind. The child’s death—and the loss of the Indian village and of the old chief and the recurring vision of that oppression and the inhumanity of their kind—and the deep loneliness of this place—all wrought upon them. Moreover, the spring of inward growth was strong and constant. Year by year, with Joan as with Aderhold, the spirit travelled further in all its dimensions.
The mind.... Here upon this span of earth the old ache for knowledge, the old brooding and longing of the mind came back to Aderhold, came more imperiously, larger, wider-robed. This ball of earth and the criss-cross of movement upon it. This sun and the chain that held to it the ball of earth. What was the chain? These stars and clouds of stars—this sea of ether—light in waves.... Again, the growth of plants—motion fluent as a stream. And the life that dwelt in shells—that made its armour and outgrew it.... Ceaseless change, transition,—kinds linked by likeness to other kinds, kinds growing out of other kinds, the trunk branching. He thought that all kinds might have branched from one or few, and the selfsame sap in all. He did not believe in a myriad unconnected, arbitrary creations.... But if the least leaf and tendril knew motion, alteration, growth, then the sap, too, knew it—the sap that was supposed to be so moveless, so perfected.... Kin and kin again—one and one again.
As for Joan—her mind trod differing roads, though with many a point of contact, many an inn where she met him who travelled too. As of Heron’s cottage her hands and head had wrought a bright pastoral, an unfrayed and well-woven garment of life—as in the peopled island she had with a larger and a freer play, with a more creative and a nobler touch, made life not an idyll only, but an idyll and something more, so here she lived a nobler poem. Her child’s death brought into it deeper tones, as of an organ, as of violins. And as she had lit torches for Aderhold, so had he lit torches for her. She thought and imaged with a wider sweep than had once been possible. She thought and imaged now for the whole world; she dreamed light for all.
To both the time upon this isle was a time of deepening vision, of a crescent sense of inward freedom and power. To a stranger’s chance-lighting eye they would have seemed but two castaways, narrowly environed, scantly living, lonely and lost, of necessity wretched. They were not wretched, or lonely, or lost.
Months passed—the year—a great part of another year. Then one day again they saw a sail.... It was the beginning of the stormy season, and there had been rough weather. To-day the sky was blue, the air but gently moving, but there had been a gale to drive ships and make wrecks. This ship had not been greatly hurt, but the winds had driven her out of her course. Moreover, there had been leakage among her water-casks. It was with joy that she saw this islet lift upon the horizon. She made it, found a large-enough harbour, between two horns of coral rock and sand, and presently sent her longboat, filled with seamen, to the shore. They rowed in cautiously, keeping a good lookout, for, while it was but an islet and looked desert, there might be Indians or pirates or Spaniards. No harm showing, they made a landing and came upon the shore.—It was now to search for water.
In the search they found a palm-thatched hut, and, standing expectant before it, a white man and woman.—“Who be you?” demanded the boatswain in good Devon.
The ship was the Eagle, sailing home from Virginia, having brought out colonists and supplies. Now it was taking home samples of native products, two or three Indians for show, and not a few dissatisfied adventurers, with others of a stouter make who were bound with representations to the Company or upon various upgathering missions.... Who were the white man and woman? They were Giles and Ellice Heme, shipwrecked here several years ago. The captain, who presently came ashore, was questioning them. From London? Aye, then! and their ship? The Needs Must, sailing from port of London. The captain rubbed his brows. He did not remember the ship or the loss of her, but then more and more ships were going out, and he could not remember all names or accidents. All lost? Giles and Ellice Heme could not tell. They had escaped in a small boat. Those with them had died.—Would they be taken back to England?—The captain was a bluff old sea-dog, literal-minded and not inquisitive. He assumed that their tale was true in the main, and he assumed that, of course, they wished to be taken back to England. Otherwise, there would be something wrong with them. He hardly waited for an answer, but turned eyes and mind toward the water-casks. He was in haste; he wished to up sail and away while the sky was still without clouds.
The two, left alone at last after all exclamation and question, faced a decision—how momentous an one made itself felt between them. They stood in the brown light of their hut, the doorway framing blue sea and sky and the Eagle, quivering to be gone.
Aderhold spoke. “If we refused to go, it is most likely—it is certain, I think—that they would force us with them. We should be thought mad—or if not that, they would hold that we were not simply castaways. They would take us still, and from the first we should rest under suspicion.”
“At any time the Spaniards may come again,” said Joan; “then again horror ... death. Or some other harm may come to one of us here—and the other left alone. That is often in my mind, and I know that it is often in yours.”