“Yes.”
“I should go down to my grave broken-hearted were harm to come to her.”
“I understand.”
“No, you cannot, you who talk of wars as pastimes, you who have no child to guard.”
“I understand,” repeated Vytal, breathing heavily, and Marlowe, to relieve the tension, declared fervently, “We will defend the women to the last man.”
Vytal turned to him as though he would have asked a question, but looked away again in silence.
They were now nearing the workers on the beach, who made ready to return for the night to their cabins in the fly-boat and Admiral, where they were to sleep until the town had been rebuilt. Seeing the governor stop to speak with one of the assistants, Marlowe turned to his taciturn friend. “May I share that hermit’s hut with you?”
“I would share it with no other,” and Vytal looked down at the poet as at a younger brother. Marlowe’s face brightened. He started ahead with a buoyant step. “Now we shall live together, a pair of barbarians, heavily armed against the world and waiting to see which must be the last man.” He would have run on further in his reckless manner, but there came no response to the outburst of defiant enthusiasm. Turning to ascertain the reason, he was surprised to find that his companion, who had dropped behind him, was at this moment entering the woods in company with Manteo, the Indian.
“My brother, a tongue of smoke licks the sky far to the southward; yet the forest burns not; the smoke is from the shore.”