Jesse Devereaux helped her, and kept them, saying as he drew her little hand closely within his arm:
"I will carry them and see you safe home."
Arm in arm they paced along under the brilliant moonlight, with the solemn voice of the ocean in their ears. But they were heedless. They heard only the beating of their own excited hearts.
The mere presence of this man, whom she had never met till to-day, filled Liane's innocent heart with ecstasy.
To be near him like this, with her arm linked in his so close that she felt the quick throbbing of his disturbed heart; to meet the glances of his passionate, dark eyes, to hear the murmuring tones of his musical voice as he talked to her so kindly—oh, it was bliss such as she had never enjoyed before, but that she could have wished might go on now forever!
He made her tell him all that the stranger had said to her, and Liane felt him give a quick start when Roma's name was mentioned, although he said lightly:
"He must be some discarded lover of Miss Clarke."
"Yes," she answered, and, raising her eyes, she saw near at hand the wretched shanty she called her home.
How short their walk had been—barely a minute it seemed to the girl! But now they must part.
She essayed to draw her hand from his clasping arm, murmuring: