red tide from the wound in his breast. As the full meaning of the scene
dawned upon her she started to her feet, looking wonderfully beautiful
amongst those dusky forms, and extending her hands to me began to cry in
the most piteous way. I sprang forward, and as I did so saw an ape-man
clap his hairy paw over her mouth and face--it was like an eclipse of the
moon by a red earth-shadow, I thought at the moment--and drag her roughly
back, but that was about the last I remembered. As I turned to hit him
standing on the slippery thwart, another rogue crept up behind and let
drive with a club he had in hand. The cudgel caught me sideways on the
head, a glancing shot. I can recall a blaze of light, a strange medley
of sounds in my ears, and then, clutching at a pile of stuffs as I fell,
a tall bower of spray rising on either hand, and the cool shock of the
blue sea as I plunged headlong in--but nothing after that!

How long after I know not, but presently a tissue of daylight crept into
my eyes, and I awoke again. It was better than nothing perhaps, yet it
was a poor awakening. The big sun lay low down, and the day was all but
done; so much I guessed as I rocked in that light with an undulating
movement, and then as my senses returned more fully, recognised with
a start of wonder that I was still in the water, floating on a swift
current into the unknown on an air-filled pile of silken stuffs which
had been pulled down with me from the boat when I got my ganging from
yonder rascal's mace. It was a wet couch, sodden and chilly, but as the
freshening evening wind blew on my face and the darkening water lapped
against my forehead I revived more fully.

Where had we come to? I turned an aching neck, and all along on both
sides seemed to stretch steep, straight coasts about a mile or so apart,
in the shadow of the setting sun black as ebony. Between the two the
hampered water ran quickly, with, away on the right, some shallow sandy