"And who am I then?" Kesserich demanded eagerly. "Who am I?"
* * * * *
The girl swayed. She brushed her head with her hand.
"It's so strange," she said, with a dreamy, almost laughing throb in
her voice that turned Jack's heart cold. "I'm sure I've never seen you
before in my life, and yet it's as if I'd known you forever. As if you
were closer to me than--"
"Stop it!" Jack shouted at Kesserich. "Mary loves me. She loves me
because I've shown her the lie her life has been, and because she's
coming away with me now. Aren't you, Mary?"
He swung her around so that her blank face was inches from his own.
"It's me you love, isn't it, Mary?"
She blinked doubtfully.
At that moment Kesserich charged at them, went sprawling as Jack's fist
shot out. Jack swept up Mary and ran with her across the lawn. Behind
him he heard an agonized cry--Kesserich's--and cruel, mounting laughter
from Hani and Hilda.
Once through the ragged doorway in the fence, he made his way more
slowly, gasping. Out of the shelter of the trees, the wind tore at them
and the ocean roared. Moonlight glistened, now on the spine of black
wet rocks, now on the foaming surf.
Jack realized that the girl in his arms was speaking rapidly,
disjointedly, but he couldn't quite make out the sense of the words and
then they were lost in the crash of the surf. She struggled, but he
told himself that it was only because she was afraid of the menacing
waters.
He pushed recklessly into the breaking surf, raced gasping across the
middle of the spine as the rocks uncovered, sprang to the higher ones
as the next wave crashed behind, showering them with spray. His chest
burning with exertion, he carried the girl the few remaining yards to
where the _Annie O._ was tossing. A sudden great gust of wind almost
did what the waves had failed to do, but he kept his footing and
lowered the girl into the boat, then jumped in after.