_ BOOK I. PORT NASSAU
CHAPTER XIII. RUTH SETS OUT
Manasseh had wrapped Master Dicky up warm in a couple of rugs, and spread a third about his feet. In the ample state seat of the coach the child reclined as easily as in a bed. He began to doze while the vehicle yet jolted over the road crossing the headland; and when it gained the track, and the wheels rolled smoothly on the hard sand, the motion slid him deep into slumber.
He came out of it with a start and a catch of the breath, and for a full half-minute lay with all his senses numbed, not so much scared as bewildered. In his dreams he had been at home in Boston, and he searched his little brain, wondering why he was awake, and if he should call for Miss Quiney (who slept always within hail, in a small bedroom); and why, when the night-nursery window lay to the left of his bed, strange lights should be flashing on his right, where the picture of King William landing at Torbay hung over his washstand.
The lights moved to and fro, then they were quenched, and all was dark about him. But he heard Manasseh's voice, some way off, in the darkness, and the sound of it brought him to his bearings. He was in the coach, he remembered; and realising this, he was instantly glad--for he was a plucky child--that he had not called out to summon Miss Quiney.
Had there been an accident? At any rate he was not hurt. His father had ridden on ahead, and would reach home many hours in advance. The boy had learnt this from Manasseh. He reasoned that, if an accident had happened, his father would not hear of it--would be riding forward, further and further into the night. He wondered how Manasseh and the grooms would manage without his father, who always gave the orders and was never at a loss.
He sat up, peering out into the night. He was still peering thus, building hasty wild guesses, when again a light showed, waving as it drew nearer. It came close; it was one of the coach-lamps, and blazed full into his eyes through the window. The door opened, letting in the roar of the beach and smiting his small nostrils with sea-brine, that with one breath purged away the stuffy scent of leather.
Manasseh was handing some one into the coach.
"De child--Mas' Richard--if you'll tak' care, miss. He's fas' asleep, prob'ly."
"But I'm _not_," said Dicky, sitting bolt upright and gathering his rugs about him. "Who is it?"
Manasseh perhaps did not hear. He made no reply, at any rate, but turned the lamp full on Ruth Josselin as she sank back against the cushions on Dicky's right.
"You will find plenty rugs, miss."
He shut the door. Dicky, holding his breath, heard him replace the lamp in its socket, and felt the soft tilt of his great weight as he climbed to the perch behind.
"R--right away!"
There was a tug, and the great coach rolled forward. In the darkness Dicky caught the sound of a smothered sob.
"Who are you?" he asked. There was no response, and after a moment he added, "I know. You are the girl who put out the fire. I like you."
He was very sleepy. He wondered why she did not answer; but, his childish instinct assuring him that she was a friend, in his somnolence he felt nothing other than trust in her. He nestled close in his rugs and reached out an arm.
It rubbed across the weals on Ruth's back, and was torture. She clenched her teeth, while tears--tears of physical anguish, irrepressible--over-brimmed her lashes and fell uncounted in the darkness.
"You are crying. Why? I like you." The child's voice trailed off into dream.
"Closer!" whispered Ruth, and would have forced the embrace upon her pain; but it relaxed. Dicky's head fell sideways, and rested, angled between the cushions and her shoulder.
She sat wide-eyed, staring into folds of darkness, while the coach rolled forward smoothly towards the dawn. _