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Nor did she ever try to steal Davis’ pocket-handkerchief.

Harman possessed a blazing parti-coloured bandana handkerchief. It was silk, and had cost him half a dollar at Mixon’s at the foot of Third Street, which adjoins Long Wharf. It was his main possession. He used it not as handkerchiefs are used, but as an adjunct to conversation as your old French marquis used his snuff-box. Stumped for words or in perplexity, out would come the handkerchief to be mopped across his brow.

Kinie from the first had been fascinated by this handkerchief. She wanted it. One day he lost it, and an hour later she flashed across his vision with it bound around her head. He chased her, recaptured it, reduced her to sulks for twenty-four hours, and a few days later she boldly tried to steal it again. Then she seemed to forget all about it; but do women ever forget?

One morning some two months after they had landed, Davis, coming out of the house, found the beach in turmoil. Girls were shading their eyes towards the sea, and young fellows getting canoes in order for launching, while children raced along the sands screaming the news or stood fascinated like the girls, and, like them, gazing far to sea.