Part 44 (1/2)

”Oh, no; I have my seal-skin jacket on; and it is so sheltered here. I wish you were as well off.”

”You are not afraid to be alone down there?”

”I am not alone when your voice is near me. Now don't you fidget yourself, dear friend. I like these little excitements. I have told you so before. Listen. How calm and silent it all is; the place; the night!

The mind seems to fill with great ideas, and to feel its immortality.”

She spoke with solemnity, and he heard in silence.

Indeed it was a reverend time and place. The sea, whose loud and penetrating tongue had, in some former age, created the gully where they both sat apart, had of late years receded and kissed the sands gently that calm night; so gently, that its long, low murmur seemed but the echo of tranquillity.

The voices of that pair sounded supernatural, one speaking up, and the other down, the speakers quite invisible.

”Mr. Hazel,” said Helen, in a low, earnest voice; ”they say that night gives wisdom even to the wise; think now, and tell me your true thoughts.

Has the foot of man ever trod upon this island before?”

There was a silence due to a question so grave, and put with solemnity, at a solemn time, in a solemn place.

At last Hazel's thoughtful voice came down. ”The world is very, very, very old. So old, that the words 'Ancient History' are a falsehood, and Moses wrote but as yesterday. And man is a very old animal upon this old, old planet; and has been everywhere. I cannot doubt he has been here.”

Her voice went up. ”But have you seen any signs?”

His voice came down. ”I have not looked for them. The bones and the weapons of primeval man are all below earth's surface at this time of day.”

There was a dead silence. Then Helen's voice went up again. ”But in modern times? Has no man landed here from far-off places, since s.h.i.+ps were built?”

The voice came sadly down. ”I do not know.”

The voice went up. ”But think!”

The voice came down. ”What calamity can be new in a world so old as this?

Everything we can do, and suffer, others of our race have done, and suffered.”

The voice went up. ”Hus.h.!.+ there's something moving on the sand.”

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

HAZEL waited and listened. So did Helen, and her breath came fast; for in the stilly night she heard light but mysterious sounds. Something was moving on the sand very slowly and softly, but nearer and nearer. Her heart began to leap. She put out her hand instinctively to clutch Mr.

Hazel; but he was too far off. She had the presence of mind and the self-denial to disguise her fears; for she knew he would come headlong to her a.s.sistance.

She said in a quavering whisper, ”I'm not frightened; only v--very c--curious.”

And now she became conscious that not only one but several things were creeping about.

Presently the creeping ceased, and was followed by a louder and more mysterious noise. In that silent night it sounded like raking and digging. Three or four mysterious visitants seemed to be making graves.

This was too much; especially coming as it did after talk about the primeval dead. Her desire to scream was so strong, and she was so afraid Hazel would break his neck, if she relieved her mind in that way, that she actually took her handkerchief and bit it hard.

But this situation was cut short by a beneficent luminary. The sun rose with a magnificent bound--it was his way in that lat.i.tude--and everything unpleasant winced that moment; the fog s.h.i.+vered in its turn, and appeared to open in furrows as great javelins of golden light shot through it from the swiftly rising orb.