At the word “cave” the submerged rose in Calypso’s cheeks almost came to the surface of their beautiful olive.

“Cave!” she countered manfully, “who said it was a cave?”

“It was merely a figure of speech, which—­if I may say so, my dear—­might apply with equal fitness, say—­to a silk stocking.”

And Calypso laughed through another tide of rose-colour.

“No, Dad, not that either.  Never mind where it is.  It is perfectly safe, I assure you.”

“But are you sure, my dear?  Wouldn’t it be safer, after all, here in the house?  How can you be certain that no one but yourself will accidentally discover it?”

“I am absolutely certain that no one will,” she answered, with an emphasis on the last three words which sent a thrill through me, for I knew that it was meant for me.  Indeed, as she spoke, she furtively gave me one of those glances of soft fire which had burnt straight through to my heart in Sweeney’s store—­a sort of blended challenge and appeal.

“Of course, Dad,” she added, “if you insist—­you shall have it.  But seriously I think it is safer where it is, and if I were to fetch it, how can I be sure that no one”—­she paused, with a meaning which I, of course, understood—­“Tobias, for instance, would see me going—­and follow me.”

“To be sure—­to be sure,” said the “King.”  “What do you think, friend Ulysses?”

“I think it more than likely that she might be followed,” I answered, “and I quite agree with Miss Calypso.  I certainly wouldn’t advise her to visit her treasure just now—­with the woods probably full of eyes.  In fact,” I added, smiling frankly at her, “I could scarcely answer for myself even—­for I confess that she has filled me with an overpowering curiosity.”

And in my heart I stood once more amid the watery gleams and echoes of that moonlit cavern, struck dumb before that shining princess from whose mouth and hands had fallen those strange streams of gold.

“So be it then,” said the “King”; “and now to consider what our friend here graphically speaks of as those eyes in the woods.  ’The woods were full of eyes.’  Ah! friend Ulysses, you evidently share my taste for the romantic phrase.  Who cares how often it has been used?  It is all the better for that.  Like old wine, it has gained with age.  One’s whole boyhood seems to be in a phrase like that—­Dumas, Scott, Fenimore Cooper.  How often, I wonder, has that divine phrase been written—­’the woods were full of eyes.’  And now to think that we are actually living it—­an old boy like myself even.  ‘The woods were full of eyes.’  Bravo!  Ulysses, for it is still a brave and gallant world!”

The “King” then made a determined descent into the practical.  The woods, most probably, were full of eyes.  In plain prose, we were almost certainly being watched.  Unless—­unless, indeed, my bogus departure for Nassau had fooled Tobias as we had hoped.  But, even so, with that lure of Calypso’s doubloon ever before him, it was too probable that he would not leave the neighbourhood without some further investigation—­“an investigation,” the “King” explained, “which might well take the form of a midnight raid; murdered in our beds, and so forth.”