A sailor cast them a whirling rope, up which Wheaton clambered; then, tying the gripsack to its end, they sent it after.

“Important!” the young man yelled at the officer on the bridge.  “Government business.”  He heard a muffled clang in the engine-room, the thrash of the propellers followed, and the big ship glided past.

As Glenister dragged himself up the beach, upon landing, Helen Chester called to him, and made room for him beside her.  It had never been necessary to call him to her side before; and equally unfamiliar was the abashment, or perhaps physical weariness, that led the young man to sink back in the warm sand with a sigh of relief.  She noted that, for the first time, the audacity was gone from his eyes.

“I watched your race,” she began.  “It was very exciting and I cheered for you.”

He smiled quietly.

“What made you keep on after the ship started?  I should have given up—­and cried.”

“I never give up anything that I want,” he said.

“Have you never been forced to?  Then it is because you are a man.  Women have to sacrifice a great deal.”

Helen expected him to continue to the effect that he would never give her up—­it was in accordance with his earlier presumption—­ but he was silent; and she was not sure that she liked him as well thus as when he overwhelmed her with the boldness of his suit.  For Glenister it was delightful, after the perils of the night, to rest in the calm of her presence and to feel dumbly that she was near.  She saw him secretly caress a fold of her dress.

If only she had not the memory of that one night on the ship.  “Still, he is trying to make amends in the best way he can,” she thought.  “Though, of course, no woman could care for a man who would do such a thing.”  Yet she thrilled at the thought of how he had thrust his body between her and danger; how, but for his quick, insistent action, she would have failed in escaping from the pest ship, failed in her mission, and met death on the night of her landing.  She owed him much.

“Did you hear what happened to the good ship Ohio?” she asked.

“No; I’ve been too busy to inquire.  I was told the health officers quarantined her when she arrived, that’s all.”

“She was sent to Egg Island with every one aboard.  She has been there more than a month now and may not get away this summer.”

“What a disappointment for the poor devils on her!”

“Yes, and only for what you did, I should be one of them,” Helen remarked.

“I didn’t do much,” he said.  “The fighting part is easy.  It’s not half so hard as to give up your property and lie still while—­”

“Did you do that because I asked you to—­because I asked you to put aside the old ways?” A wave of compassion swept over her.

“Certainly,” he answered.  “It didn’t come easy, but—­”

“Oh, I thank you,” said she.  “I know it is all for the best.  Uncle Arthur wouldn’t do anything wrong, and Mr. McNamara is an honorable man.”