At a certain distance all paused. The night was very nearly still. A faint breeze carried the soaring sparks away from the tiny island forest and out toward the water.
As the scores of craft came to rest they formed a semi-circle.
It was strange. The quiet of the night, the flames rushing silently upward. The light on the water, the faces of two hundred people, tense, motionless, lighted red by the flames. And above it all a million stars.
Florence had seen something akin to this pictured in a book. She searched her mind for that picture and found it; a circle of gray wolves sitting in a circle about a half burned-out camp fire, beside which a lone wanderer slept.
“Only these are not wolves,” she told herself. “They are people, kind-hearted people. It is the home of wolves that is going up in flames. May they never return!”
“And they never will.” She started at the sound of a voice at her elbow. Unconsciously she had spoken aloud. Tillie, who had slipped up beside her in her rowboat, had answered.
“That is not their island,” Tillie explained. “They only leased it. Now they will not be allowed to rebuild.”
“You should thank God for that.”
“I have,” Tillie replied frankly.
Once more there was silence.