Another silence supervened. After three unsuccessful efforts at speech, Elaine at last found the voice and the courage for a question:
"Do you wish to be—best man?"
Grenville spread out his fingers, for further inspection.
"I probably shouldn't have suggested it otherwise."
She turned upon him impulsively. "Sidney, are you absolutely honest?"
"Oh, I wouldn't trouble old Diogenes to get out of his grave and look me up," he answered, in his customary spirit, "but I've got a faint idea what honor means."
How well she knew his various manners of evasion! Her heart was pounding furiously. She leaned with all her weight against the rail, as if for fear he must hear its clamorous confessions.
She had never been so excited in her life—or more courageous. Likewise she felt she possessed certain God-given rights that were poised at the brink of disaster. For a love like hers comes never lightly and is not to be lightly dismissed. Her utterance was difficult, but mastered.
"One night—in the smoke—on the island—when we might have died of thirst—and you came with water—— You remember what you said?"
"Concerning what?"