Then suddenly her rapt expression broke into a merry smile.  “I know!  Of course!  Absurdly easy!  I shall tell him that I am under a spell too—­bound beyond all chance of escape to marry an Englishman.”  The sweet face dimpled over the inspiration.  “That ought to settle him, unless he is very persevering; in which case of course I should have to tell him—­quite kindly—­that I really didn’t think I could.  Fancy marrying a crab—­and a French crab too!”

She began to laugh, gaily, irrepressibly, light-heartedly, and skipped on to the first weed-covered rock that obstructed her path.  It was an exceedingly slippery perch.  She poised herself with arms outspread, with a butterfly grace as airy as her visions.

Away in the distance Cinders, nearing exhaustion, leaned on one elbow and scratched spasmodically with his free paw.

“Good-bye, Cinders!” she called to him in her high young voice.  “I’m never coming back any more.”

Lightly she waved her hand and sprang for another rock.  But her feet slipped on the seaweed, and she splashed down into a pool ankle-deep.

“Bother!” she said, with vehemence.  “It’s these silly sandals.  I’ll leave them here till I come back.”

She scrambled out again and pulled them off.  “If I really don’t come back I shan’t want them,” she reflected, with her merry little smile.

She arranged sandals and towel on the flat surface of a rock and pursued her pilgrimage unhampered.

She certainly managed better without the sandals, but even as it was she slipped and slid a good deal on the treacherous seaweed.  It took her considerably longer than she had anticipated to cross that belt of rocks.  It was much farther than it looked.  Moreover, the pools were so full of interest that she had to stop and investigate them as she went.  Anemones, green and red, clung to the shining rocks, and crabs of all sizes scuttled away at her approach.

“What a lot of retainers he must have!” said Chris.

She was nearing the Gothic archway, and her heart began to beat fast in anticipation.  What she really expected to find she could not have said.  But undoubtedly this particular cave was many degrees more mysterious and more eerie than any other she had ever explored.  It was very lonely, and the cliff that frowned above her was very black.  The afternoon sun shone genially upon all things, however, and this gave her courage.

The waves foamed among the rocks but a few yards from the jutting headland.  Already the tide was turning.  That meant that her time was short.

“I won’t go beyond the entrance to-day,” said Chris.  “But to-morrow I’ll start earlier and go right in.  P’raps Cinders will come too.  It wouldn’t be so lonely with Cinders.”