Strolling thus in front of the old house with its big chimneys and verandas, Lawrence thought he would go and sit down on one of those verandas: people who saw him would suppose he was enjoying the scenery, and he was conscious of an imperative desire to think calmly. That was what he had been trying to do all the way down here,—think calmly. He called himself an idiot, an unmitigated idiot, for coming at all. How should he better things by coming?

He rose from the old bench on which he had been sitting, and walked around the corner of the house. Walking, thus, he came upon a man and a woman standing there within the shade of some thick clambering vines.

The man's back was towards Lawrence but the woman's face was plain to his sight, with upraised eyes and—he could not be sure of the expression, for Prudence instantly advanced, saying, briskly: "So nice of you, Rodney, to come, after all. Mr. Meramble was just suggesting that we go back to the launch and take a turn outside and see where Menendez and his ruffians came in."

"Capital idea," responded Lawrence, a trifle too pleasantly. "I always thought Menendez was rather overestimated as a scamp. You remember we looked the whole thing up when we came to Augustine, Prudence?"

He glanced at his wife with a most amiable expression. Meramble hastened to ask Lawrence to go in the launch, and Lawrence accepted with rather profuse thanks. He talked glibly as the three made their way to the bit of a craft, which required no work save what its owner could do himself.

Two or three times Prudence gave her husband a swift look in which perhaps there was a hint of questioning terror. She had never seen him in the least like this. She recalled, for the first time since she had heard it, the remark her Aunt Letitia had once made to the effect that Rodney had a terrible temper when he was roused, but that he usually kept it under control.

You would have said that these three people were on the best of terms with one another as they went talking and laughing down to the launch, and as they embarked and the little craft began to glide out into the open sea. Prudence afterward told some one that, as her husband looked full at her with such extremely pleasant eyes, she didn't know why she should think of Bluebeard and a few other characters noted for amiability to their wives.

At any rate, there was something in the suavity of Lawrence's manner that soon made it a great effort for Prudence to speak at all, try as she would. Her smile became constrained; her heart beat heavily. She sat under the little awning and looked at the two men.

Lawrence was telling a story with good effect; sometimes he smiled as he talked; he was really very entertaining and very good-humored. His wife endeavored to forget the time when she had given him a certain promise. Were such promises ever kept, any more than the false vows that men were continually making?

The launch was going quite fast, straight out on the smooth water to sea. The land was already two or three miles away.

Prudence saw Lawrence turn and look towards the coast that lay low, its white sand glittering in the bright light. Then he glanced towards Meramble. "Can you swim, Mr. Meramble?" he asked, presently.

"Certainly," the man replied, with a slight accent of surprise.

"So fortunate," returned Lawrence.

"Why fortunate?"

"Because I am presently going to throw you into the sea," was the suave answer.

The other man thought this was a joke, and a very poor joke. But he laughed, and said there might be a difference of opinion about that.

"Oh, no, I think not; I think I can do it easily."

"Ah!"

Meramble's white teeth glittered in his black beard. Yes, it was a joke in the very worst possible taste, and before Mrs. Lawrence, too. But he smiled all the same as he uttered the interjection.

The sense of electricity in the clear air suddenly became almost intolerable.

"Damn him!" Meramble was saying to himself, "what's he talking like that for?"

Lawrence sat silent for a few moments, gazing towards the shore. Prudence made an effort to keep up some kind of conversation. Though Rodney terrified her, she was secretly admiring him. She was thinking that she had not known he could be exactly like this.

Lawrence turned from his contemplation of the receding shore to objects nearer.

He rose with the utmost quietness of movement. He stooped slightly, and, notwithstanding the quick and furious warding motion made by Meramble, that gentleman was lifted bodily up, and flung over the boat's side, where he fell splashing into the water.

The boat darted away from him, but not so soon that the two in it could not hear the terrible oath he uttered.

"Oh, Rodney!" cried Prudence, starting from her seat.

"Sit down," said Rodney, calmly, but his face was not quite steady. Now that his anger had done something to satisfy itself, he must begin to feel the reaction in some way.

"He will drown," said Prudence.

"No matter."

"But you will be hanged."

"In that case you will be a widow."

Here Lawrence began to laugh. Drops of moisture appeared on his forehead.

Prudence rose again. This time she came and was going to sit down by her husband, but he made a gesture for her to go back.

"He won't drown,—never fear," he said.

"As if I cared whether he drowned or not!" she cried. "It's you I care for."

At this Lawrence laughed again. He was watching Meramble, who was swimming after them, his black head shining on top of the water.

Now he withdrew his eyes from Meramble, and fixed them on his wife. He felt as if a devil were in him that was not yet satisfied. And why should he still have that furious, unreasoning love for this woman? Had she not jilted him once, and when she could not get her English lord, had she not won him again? Did she love him? Had she ever loved him? Good God! it was dreadful to look at her now and doubt her. There was terror in her face, but there was something else, too, the thing which had lured him and held him, and which he was afraid would always hold him; and it seemed to be love for him,—some cruel passion which a woman like her was capable of feeling, even while she coquetted with other men. He did not understand; he was not going to endure it.

Lawrence was sitting in the place just occupied by Meramble. He wished to be ready to attend to the launch; he had put it about directly, and they were now returning to the shore. Prudence had taken her seat near him. With some appearance of timidity she leaned forward and touched his sleeve.

"I would never testify against you," she said, in an awed whisper, her terror plainly visible.

"Testify?" he repeated, scornfully; "never fear about that. That creature won't drown; and he'll never tell how he came to have this bath. I didn't seem to have any opportunity to thrash him, so I threw him over. If you think he's going to drown, I'll stop and pick him up. I'm afraid he won't love me any the better for this. I had to do it, however, or kill him outright."

Lawrence spoke so rapidly that his words were hardly distinguishable. He no longer attempted to seem amiable. There was a ferocious light in his eyes, and he was very pale. Altogether he looked as a man may look who for the time has given himself over to the devil. Being an honorable man with an unseared conscience, he would have to pay a good price in self-contempt for the last half-hour. But the time for the self-contempt had not yet struck.

Prudence sat quietly trembling,—nay, she was almost cowering,—watching her companion with great eyes that made her face wild and strange. Why is it that an outbreak of savage Berserker blood so often excites admiration in the spectator? Does a drop of that same barbarian blood mingle yet with the milder current of civilization?

It was not the way of Prudence to keep silent, no matter what was happening. But she was afraid to speak now, and afraid to remain silent. She hesitated; she wanted to grasp her husband's arm, but the slight touch she had given him was all she dared. Was this the man whom she had been able to influence? Odd that she should be so proud of him because he had picked up Meramble and tossed him over the boat's side. Odd that she should be sure that she should never have any interest in Meramble again. How contemptible he had looked, flying over the side! But he had had a great way with his eyes, and he was said to be dangerous.

Here she laughed hysterically.

Meramble, swimming along behind, happened to hear that laugh, and he gnashed his teeth as if he were the villain of a melodrama. And he swore also, and swam still faster through the smooth water. If he had had a pistol in his hand at that moment, it is quite probable that he would have fired at those two in the launch, and I am quite certain he would have aimed at the woman first. Fortunately, however, in these days of high enlightenment we do not usually have revolvers within reach every time we are indignant.

"Do let him get in, Rodney," Prudence at length exclaimed, as soon as she could stop laughing.

At this Lawrence literally glared at her. Then he asked if she were so anxious concerning her friend's safety.

"No," she answered, hardily; "I don't care a penny whether he drowns or not. But you—oh, I'm afraid for you! He won't love you after this."

Then, in spite of herself, she began to laugh again, and then she burst into a violent fit of weeping, bending forward and hiding her face in her hands as she did so.

"No," said Lawrence, grimly; "I don't think I've done anything to win his affection."

As he spoke, he slowed the launch. Its owner presently came up alongside and laid hold of the boat's edge.

"Do you want to get aboard?" inquired Lawrence.

It was an instant before Meramble could reply. Poor devil, it was hard on him!

"Is there any other craft near?" he asked, finally. Lawrence gazed leisurely about him. "None within five miles, I should say," was the answer.

To this Meramble made no reply in words. The launch came to a stand, and he scrambled aboard. It is dreadful when a human being has within him quite so much of a wild-beast rage. Meramble knew that he had been made ridiculous before this woman. He knew that he was dripping and ridiculous now. He had not been in any real danger; real danger would have eliminated the ridiculous.

Lawrence rose, bowed, and relinquished the charge of the launch to its owner.

Meramble sat down without a word. Since he could not use the violent oaths which were all the words he wanted to use, he did not know why he should speak at all.

So it was in entire silence that the three went back to land. The group on the shore came down to the wharf, uttering exclamations and inquiries.

Meramble explained that he had been awkward enough to fall into the water, but that Lawrence (with a look at that gentleman) had been kind enough to rescue him, and he added that he, Meramble, should never rest until he had been able to do as much for Mr. Lawrence.

Somebody on the wharf affirmed that, at this speech, Mrs. Lawrence shuddered unmistakably. Therefore, a wise few immediately asserted that there was more in Meramble's falling into the water than met the eye.

When Lawrence tried to recall how he and his wife reached St. Augustine and the Ponce that night, he could never remember the slightest thing. Apparently they did get back the same as the rest of the party.

The next day the owner of the sailboat came to Lawrence and demanded to know what had become of it. Then Lawrence endeavored to carry his mind back to the sailboat, and to explain. But it ended in his paying the man an exorbitant price for the boat, and so settling the matter that way.