"The child, Jim!" shivered Caius hoarsely. "She threw it into the
water!"
"In there?" asked Jim, pointing to the flowing darkness from which they
had just scrambled. He shook his head as he spoke. "There's a sort of a
set the water's got round this here place----" He shook his head again;
he sat half dressed on the edge of the grass, peering into the tide, a
dark figure surrounded by darkness.
It seemed to Caius even then, just pulled out as he was from a sea too
strong for him, that there was something horribly bad and common in that
they two sat there taking breath, and did not plunge again into the
water to try, at least, to find the body of the child who a few minutes
before had lived and breathed so sweetly. Yet they did not move.
"Did someone else come to hold her?" Caius asked this in a hasty
whisper. They both spoke as if there was some need for haste.
"Noa. I tied her round with your fish-cord. If yo'd have done that, yo'
might have got the babby the same way I got yo'."
The heart of Caius sank. If only he had done this! Jim Hogan was not a
companion for whom he had any respect; he looked upon him as a person of
low taste and doubtful morals, but in this Jim had shown himself
superior.
"I guess we'd better go and look after them," said Jim. He waded in a
few paces. "Come along," he said.
As they waded round to the inner side of the island, Caius slowly took
off some of his wet clothes and tied them round his neck.
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