The main house stood close to the river, there being but a strip of lawn between the piazza and the top of the sea-wall. On the left, as Constans faced, an enclosed vestibule led to a secondary structure, which probably contained the domestic offices and servants' quarters. Still farther on, and under the same continuous albeit slightly lower roof-line, were the stables and cattle barns, the wood and other storehouses forming the extreme left wing. In its day, Arcadia House had been an eminently respectable and comfortable dwelling, and even now it presented a tolerably good appearance; certainly it might be called habitable. Constans, straining his eyes, for the afternoon was advancing, thought he saw smoke ascending from one of the chimneys, and this incited him to an actual invasion of the premises.
He chose the southwestern corner of the block as being farthest removed from the range of the house windows. A lucky throw made the grapples fast, and it took but an instant to run up the rungs. There was no one in sight, so Constans, shifting the ladder to the inner side, made the descent quite at his ease, and found himself in a little plantation of spruce-trees.
The evergreens grew so thickly together that he had some difficulty in forcing his way through them. Breaking free at last, he stepped out into the open, and stood vis-à-vis with a girl who had been advancing, as it were, to meet him. Constans knew instantly that this could be none other than Mad Scarlett's daughter, and there, indeed, were the proofs—the red-gold hair and the tawny eyes, just as Elena had described them in her message and Ulick in his endless lover's rhapsodies.
She stood mute and wide-eyed before him, the color in her cheeks coming and going like a flickering candle. Constans naturally concluded that his appearance had frightened her. He retreated a step or two; he tried to think of something to say that would reassure her. Perhaps he might use Ulick's name by way of introduction. He ended by blurting out:
"Don't be afraid; I will go whenever you say."
Her lips formed rather than uttered the warning, "Sh!" She listened intently for a moment or two, but there was only the distant dripping of water to be heard, the air being extraordinarily still and windless.
"Come!" she panted, and, clutching at her skirts, led the way to a thatched pavilion some eighty yards distant, a storehouse, perhaps, or a building once used as a farm office. Constans tried to question, to protest, but for the moment his will was as flax in the flame of her resolution; he yielded and ran obediently at her side.
Arrived at the little house, the girl pushed him bodily through the doorway and entered herself, turning quickly to slip into place the oaken bar that secured the door from the inside. Constans swelled with indignation at this singular treatment. He was a man grown, not a truant child to be led away by the ear for punishment. Yet she would not abate one jot of her first advantage, and his anger melted under the quiet serenity of her gaze; in spite of himself he let her have the first word.
"Did you think I was afraid for myself?" she asked, with a slow smile that made Constans's cheeks burn. "You see, I remembered that Fangs and Blazer are generally out by this time, a full hour before dark."
"Fangs and Blazer?"