"Sometimes my own canoe I keep there too," she whispered. "Now come!"
and she hurried him along the beach and up an easier trail beyond the
rocks to her cavern bower above.
Nor did she pause for an instant's rest until they had passed safely
behind the manzanita branches which concealed the entrance. Here,
motioning him to do the same, she dropped upon a pile of skins. But
instead, in real concern, the young Englishman knelt again beside her.
"Thou art so wet and cold," he began anxiously, "Will it not make thee
ill? Yet 'twas a wondrous feat," he added admiringly, "well conceived
and carried out with skill such as any man might envy!"
The princess laughed.
'Twas nothing," she answered briefly. "I do it almost every day."
"I came to bring to thee the gift I promised," explained Lord Harold
then, and from his belt he drew the little case. Eagerly he flung the
gleaming string of garnets about her slim brown throat.
"Jewels brought by my father to my mother on the morning of their
marriage," he told her. "When she lay dying she gave them me and told me
never to part with them except I gave them to my - " He paused suddenly,
"But thou hast saved my life!" he added as quickly, "Who else could ever
deserve them more? Well know I my mother would wish thee to have them.
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