The little cove was once again as quiet as time's heart. Once again the
_Annie O._ was a sloop embedded in a mirror. Once again the rocks were
warm underfoot.
Jack Barr lifted his fiercely aching head and looked at the distant
line of the mainland, as tiny and yet as clear as something viewed
through the wrong end of a telescope. He was very tired. Searching the
island, in his present shaky condition, had taken all the strength out
of him.
He looked at the peacefully rippling sea outside the cove and thought
of what a churning pot it had been during the storm. He thought
wonderingly of his rescue--a man wedged unconscious between two rock
teeth; kept somehow from being washed away by the merest chance.
He thought of Mrs. Kesserich sitting alone in her house, scanning the
newspapers that had nothing to tell.
He thought of the empty island behind him and the vanished motorboat.
He wondered if the sea had pulled down Martin Kesserich and Mary Alice
Pope. He wondered if only Hani and Hilda had sailed away.
He winced, remembering what he had done to Martin and Mary by his
blundering infatuation. In his way, he told himself, he had been as bad
as the two old women.
He thought of death, and of time, and of love that defies them.
He stepped limpingly into the _Annie O._ to set sail--and realized that
philosophy is only for the unhappy.
Mary was asleep in the stern.