That was one of the strangest moments in his life. He had never seen anything comparable to this long white street of sand curbed with emerald waves, leading nowhere, lost, useless, desolate, brilliant with a brilliance that hit the heart as well as the eye, flown over by the white gulls.

The sands fizzed to the sea wind, and away to north and south they trembled and waved in the heat; but the curious thing was the fact that, despite their loneliness, one did not feel alone. The place seemed populous, filled with a crowd that for a moment had made itself invisible. Perhaps it was the riot of color and the brilliance of light: the effect remained.

Jude, looking round, seemed preoccupied about something. It was the absence of gulls.

“Last time I was here,” said Jude, “it was all over gulls’ nests, right here in the middle. Now they seem to have gone off to the ends. Wonder what’s come to them?”

“Maybe it’s too early for them.”

“It’s a bit early, but not much: there’s always early breeders. No, they’ve just took their hook—gulls are like that. We’ll have to go and hunt at the ends. You go north and I’ll go south.”

“Well,” said he, “it’s an awfully long way. Suppose we have something to eat first?”

“I don’t mind,” said Jude.

They got the provisions and water jar from the boat and sat down on the sands. It was past noon and cooler, for the breeze had livened up, the outgoing tide was leaving a strip of wet sand glittering like a golden sword, and the fume of beach filled the air resonant with the gentle rhythm of the waves.

They ate, leaning on their sides like old Athenians. They had no cup; so they took it in turns to drink from the water jar. Then he lit a pipe.

“This is jolly,” said he.

“Ain’t bad,” said Jude.

She made a pillow of sand for her head, and then, on her back with her head on the pillow, lay like a starfish, spread-eagled, her hat over her eyes.

He followed suit.

“How about those gulls’ nests?” he asked.

“Which ones?” evaded Jude.

“The ones you were going to hunt for?”

“Oh, them? Well, I reckon there’s dead loads of time.”

“Lots—listen to the sand!”

“It’s the wind blowing it.”

“I know. All the same this is a rum place. Do you know when we landed here, just now, the first thing that struck me?” “Naw.”

“Well, I felt as if the place was full of people.”

“Which way?”

“Oh, I don’t know; people I couldn’t see, ghosts.”

“Hants?”

“Yes.”

“What made y’ think that?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Somehow it reminded me of a story I’d once read.”

“What was the story?”

“About a beach over in the Pacific where wizards used to go and pick up shells.”

“What’s them?”

“Chaps that work magic and sell themselves to the devil. They can make themselves invisible so’s you can’t see them, and they used to come to the beach and pick up shells, and then turn the shells into silver dollars. You couldn’t see them, but you could hear them rustling about, like that sand, and talking to one another, and now and then you’d see a little fire blaze up.”

Jude, interested, rolled over, rested her chin in her palms, and kicked a bare heel to the sun.

“I reckon you’re not far wrong,” said Jude.

“How?”

“Well, I’ve felt the same way here myself, as if there was hants about and if you’d turn your head sharp you’d see someone behind you. Now you’ve talked of it. I’ll be always thinking it if I come here again. Wish you’d kept your head shut.”

She sat up and looked about her. “Sorry,” said Ratcliffe, raising himself on his arm; “but if you come again I’ll come with you, and that’ll keep the hants off—unless I’m gone.”

“How d’you mean?”

“Well, when this cruise is over I’ll have to leave you both and go home. I don’t want to go.”

Jude said nothing. Staring over the sea under the brim of her hat, she did not seem to have heard him.

“I’d much sooner stick on here with you and Satan. What’s that thing floating out there?”

“Turkle,” said Jude. “Look, he’s doing a dive!”

He sat up beside her.

“So he has. Well, he’s gone.” He sat with his knees up, looking over the sea.

Alone here with Jude she seemed a different person from what she had been aboard the Sarah. The strange antagonism she had suddenly exhibited, and a trace of which had remained up till this morning, seemed to have utterly vanished. Perhaps it was the “hants,” or the loneliness, or a combination of both, but she seemed subdued.

“Well, I don’t see what you want going for if you don’t want to,” suddenly said Jude, drawing up her knees and crossing them with her hands.

“Oh, bother!” said he. “Don’t let’s think of it; besides, we’ll fix up something. I don’t want to go. I’ve never had such a jolly time in my life, and I’m not going to lose sight of you and Satan—unless you want to.”

“Lord! I don’t want to.” “Well, that’s all right We’ll stick together, somehow, and let the old world go hang, and we’ll go hunting abalones and fishing—let’s make plans.”

His arm somehow slipped round her waist, half automatically, just as one puts one’s hand on a person’s shoulder. When he realized what he had done, he realized, at the same time, that she did not seem to mind; more than that, she reciprocated in a way by letting her shoulder rest more comfortably against his. It was companionship, pure and simple, and her mind seemed far away, wrapped in the sun-blaze as with a garment, and wandering—who knows where?

“Heave ahead,” said Jude drowsily. “What’s your plans?”

“Plans—oh, I’ve lots. Let’s go round the world in the old Sarah—get a couple more hands.”

“Where’d you stick them?”

“Well, you’ve got a foc’s’le.”

“Not big enough for a tomcat. The nigger filled it. He said he reckoned he’d got to stick his head through the hatch to breathe.”

“Well, we’ll get rid of the Sarah and get a bigger boat.”

“Lord! Don’t you never let Satan hear you say that: she’s his skin!”

“We’ll do without extra hands, then, and work her, the three of us. I can steer all right now.”

“Kin you?”

“You know jolly well I can!”

“What’s the points of the compass? Run ’em off.” “North—nor’-nor’east, nor’east—um—”

Jude chuckled subduedly.

“Heave ahead!”

“I’ve forgotten.”

“Never knew.”

“Well, maybe.”

The confiding shoulder rested more heavily against him as against a cushion and she began to hum a tune. She seemed to have forgotten the points of the compass, him, everything, just as a child suddenly forgets everything in day-dream land.

The absolute contentment of doing nothing, resting, listening to the waves, had fallen upon him too, with a something else, a sort of mesmerism born of his companion, the strangest feeling as though Jude were a part of himself, as though he had put his arm round his own waist and a new self,—a much pleasanter self than the old one, less stiff, more human, and somehow more alive.

The metronomic rhythm of the little waves falling on the sand seemed to mix his thoughts together and blur them; but he saw Skelton, Sir William Skelton, Bart., he saw a girl he, Ratcliffe, had been engaged to, he saw all sorts of men and all sorts of women, everyone he had ever known, it seemed to him, in a nebulous cluster, and they all seemed, somehow, not quite alive,—not dead, but sleeping in the trance we call civilization, their days ordered by the beat of a metronome,—get up—wash—dress—eat—work or play—eat—work or play—eat—work or play—bed—sleep—get up—wash—dress etc.,—all the figures moving like one, their very laughter and tears ordered except when they got drunk or went mad.

It seemed to him that vivid life was not so much a question of vitality as of freedom.

Was that the secret Satan had discovered,—Satan, who had no hankering after great riches, but was free as a gull? Satan and Jude were gulls,—seagulls, untamable as seagulls and as far from civilization! It was as though his arm were round a bird,—quiescent by some miracle and allowing him to handle it, and imparting to him, somehow, the knowledge of its vitality,—the vitality of freedom.

“What I like about the old Sarah,” said he, “is the way she just pots about—with nothing to do.”

“Nothing to do!”

“Well, you and Satan can take things easy.”

“Oh, can we? That’s news—what d’you call easy?”

“You have no fixed work, you can knock off when you like, you haven’t to carry cargo, or be bothered with owners, or be up to time. You are as free as the gulls.”

Jude took his hand and removed his arm from around her waist just as one removes a belt. She wanted to shift her position. She seemed to have lost interest in the conversation. Sand had got between her toes, and she removed it, running her finger between them. She had no handkerchief,—never used one or needed to use one: the perfectly healthy animal never does.

Then, crossing her legs like a tailor and squatting in front of him, she dived into the right hand pocket of her trousers and produced a dollar, a slick, evil, suspicious-looking dollar. She seemed utterly to have forgotten the gulls’-nesting business and how the time was running on, and having little passion for the business he was content not to remind her.

“I’ll match you for dollars,” said Jude. She was no longer the person of a moment ago. She was the harbor larrikin, the clodder of bathing nigger girls, a person to be avoided by pious boys with possessions in the form of money or land.

The coin spun in the air.

“Tails is the bird,” cried Jude.

“Heads, then.”

“Tails! Y’owe me a dollar.”

It spun again.

“Heads! We’re quits. Heads again, heads—oh, hell!—what you want sticking to heads for? That’s two dollars I owe you. Tails—scrumps! that’s three! Tails again, that’s four. What you want sticking to tails for? Why don’t you wabble about an’ give a body a chance? Heads—holy Mike! What’s wrong with the durned thing? Five dollars gone on a bang!”

“We’re not playing right,” said he. “We should call alternately.”

“What’s that?”

“One after the other.”

“I’m not going to play any more,” said Jude. “I’m broke. The bank’s bust and I kin’t pay you, not till I get to Havana—unless I play you double or quits. You call; I’ll toss.”

“Heads.” She sent the coin six feet high and it fell on the sand—heads!

“That settles it,” said Jude. “Ten dollars I owe you. You’ll have to wait till we get to Havana, for if Satan knew I was tossing for coins he’d sculp me. I can get some money out of the bank at Havana, pretending it’s for something else. I haven’t a cent, an’ this old dollar’s no use: it’s a dud.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” said Ratcliffe. “We were only tossing for fun.” The words were no sooner out of his mouth than he regretted them.

Jude flushed red under her freckles and sunburn.

“I’m not taking your money, thank you,” said she; then breaking out, “What the blizzard d’you think we’ve been playing at, and what you take me for? S’posin’ I’d won, you’d a paid, wouldn’t you?”

“I didn’t mean anything,” said he.

“Y’shouldn’t have said it, then,” said she.

“Well, I’m sorry—I take it back.”

She played with the dud dollar for a moment, tossing it, and catching it; then she put it into her pocket, uncrossed her legs, and lay flat; her chin resting on the back of her hands.

Her hat was off, lying beside her, and the quarrel with him was evidently over; she seemed plunged in reverie. Then he noticed that the eyes, upturned under their lashes, were steadfastly looking at him. Instantly they fell, and her position altered so that her face was hidden on her arm. He lit his pipe and smoked for a moment in silence.

“Jude!”

No answer.

“What’s the matter with you?”

Silence. He remembered how she had shammed dead on Palm Island, put down his pipe, and crawled toward the corpse. It was rigid, and to revive it he began to pour sand on its head.

“Quit fooling,” grumbled a voice; then, as if the sand had suddenly revived memory and galvanized her to life, she scrambled to her feet.

“Them eggs—and the sun’s getting down and we fooling about!” She picked up her hat. “I’ll take this end and you go t’other.”

“But I haven’t anything to gather them in.”

“Gather them in your hat, and keep a lookout for quicksan’s. If you get into one, holler and throw yourself on your back. But you’ll easy tell them—they look different from the or’nary sands.”

“How?”

“I dunno; just different. If you see the sand in front of you looking different, keep clear of it.”

Off she went.