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Show W CLARK MCMEEKIN JK, I., TBI'S FAR: Lrk Shan-wloved Shan-wloved horse, Made, was Vim '"' ,or Amerlca , tb'e Invitation of David Ibood sweetheart, who has TZtUUvaA from America. ?b'(lore. and she t lorced SJJS.. When !-. of L the ship encounter! a " to I M them their L ,be IWUM feels solid her. She saves Lancer, Wi rm oulcksand. crush the sweet green grass underfoot. under-foot. Once she saw signs of the ponies with marks of their tiny hoofs but no print big enough for Lancer was here. The tiny circles looked old and weathered, the edges wen and powdery and the spoor was half, erased. It was just before dawn the next morning that Lark awoke to hear the splash of oars and to discern the dim outline of an approaching dinghy. After a time the awkward dinghy pulled up from the tide and was beached not far from w a 4, iium ntr. a man, a boy, in rough dungarees and with unkempt hair streaming to his shoulders, shoul-ders, was coming up the sand, coming com-ing straight toward her. She stirred and he stood for a second listening, hardly more of a human figure than the ponies had been. He was tall and gaunt, but there was a narrow straightness about him that spoke of youth and of unreached and unrealized un-realized male strength. Lark's urgency roughened her voice and coarsened it. "Here," she cried out. "Here! I'm by the rock shelterl" "I see un! You leave my things be!" The figure came running toward to-ward Lark, catching up a short, out. 'Twm a great wonder anybody come out of It alive." Lark thought of those life-boats. those little boats. She said, i wal in boat and it j went do ,ui. It didn't even get a start. I gt,es, ,u vt tne otners in that boat drowned." "Doubtless. ... A girl, 'bout your age, was in the boat that got in safe. Her and her father, Squire Terraine. Complained they lost six fine horses. Half wild, those folks, postin' rewards for horses no doubt drowned, because one fellow's big gray horse swam all the way to shore, safe as a muskrat-horse owned by a squeaky-voiced man, name of Plascutt Dawes." Lark shuddered, remembering those horses in the ship's hold. "There was a powerful big woman, wom-an, Minnie Buxtree," he said. "A couple of bound wenches. ... a preaching man and a baby . . . those Terraines and that Mr. Plascutt Plas-cutt Dawes, I mentioned to you. . . . I disremember any Clelia. There was but a few." Lark was crying quietly again, the weeping of release, of joy at the filling of her terrible need for human hu-man companionship. To know her loneliness was broken was unutterably unutter-ably gratifying. He glanced at the sky, stood up, stretching his arms, a slim and beautifully beau-tifully muscular figure in the pale light. He blew out the horn lantern. He said, "Sun be up in a minute." "Is this island far from the mainland?" main-land?" Lark asked. "You could see It If it wasn't for the September fog. It's ten miles, maybe, maybe a little better . . . The Peninsula. Some call it Virginia, Vir-ginia, some Maryland. Lot o' islands is-lands hereabouts. See them, easy, on a clear day. This is Ghost Island. Is-land. There's Hurricane Island, and Pony Island, and a lot of little nameless name-less hitches of marsh grass and sand. Chincoteague, off yonder, is big, with people on her. Assateague, too. Not many people come to this place. That's why I keen my things here. chapter VI der.lv the ponies seemed ;'e alien human presence back In fright, stamping hoofs in a very ecstasy of instant they wheeled to with flying manes and heads, across the nar- Kkail, 'ho, a moment ago, apparently as bewildered eighed and quivered now understanding. He flung ad and his clarion call the mares Racing ahead Kled them straight across K the narrow island and ashing surf. In a scram-s scram-s they were after him, ll-mell, whinnying once delirious delight. Bd there at last, alone and :;r a time she wandered along the beach, idafternoon now, and the seem less lonely, less Even the noise of the loud and rhythmic and Would be better than K booming here In the in-ere in-ere their faint thunder an accent to the si- ropping ridge of rock ex- - through the island and Hast in a sort of shelving stone, perhaps some : in circumference, Just what things I got. Guineas on the shore hate and fear this island, proper." "Guineas?" "Oysterin people, along the Peninsula. Pe-ninsula. I ben't Guinea, but I reckon reck-on I look like one, all right I I live with 'em." "I've never seen any." "You'll see 'em. . . . Smell 'em before you see 'em. . . . Smells like the bottom of an old boat, does Guinea folk. I hate them, all the way through my body and soul. . . . I'm bound to Cony, four more years. Four more years. . . . My folks died off when I was twelve, and Sheriff bound me out. I've served pretty near six years. I've got four more. I'm nearly nineteen, and I've got four years" "You change from one minute to the next, Gait. At first I could hardly understand a word you said. But now you sound" "I reckon I picked up a lot of Guinea talk. My father'd break me of it if he was alive. He had a scorn for Guineas, though he doctored "em when they had a need." "Your father was a doctor?" "Doctor and preacher and poll-ticker," poll-ticker," Gait said with a clear note of pride. "He was ever a great one for books, too. I can read. Can you?" He colored up, watching her closely. Lark said gravely that she could, and he said quickly, defensively, "I knowed un could. Likely un took me for a fool to ask un that. Why do un have to question me so close?" "I won't question you." Lark smiled at him. "And you don't have to talk Guinea to me. I understood you better a while ago." He went to the dinghy and brought back a slab of bread and some strong cheese. "You must be nun- 1 beach. From here she the water and be able to )!ag any passing ship or r. fishing boat. She noted at to one side the rocks I up In a kind of pyramid, lie stones had been placed 1 shelter. wis a house, a little play-nost! play-nost! Eagerly she bent to L Branches of scrub pine crisscrossed to form a and the sand was banked i against it. The side lot rock, and the roof was t slab that only a strong d have raised. It was waist high and, at first ore like an animal's lair r.an habitation, low and peering into the it the back, Lark saw a tags, stores and treasures tacked heap. A pony skin itretched as a cover but (ioff. She crawled inside (red up the things, bring-out bring-out with her. down then and spread in front of her. Here all curving knife, flint and I a wooden box of hard its. They were a little Idamp, but Lark ate them ous delight. A while ago W some bitter red ber-foese ber-foese had not half satis-mger. satis-mger. The box was full 1 There would be enough r for several days, she She held them in her mt to eat them all now. H now foolish that would 1 n effort of will power, "d most of them to the next a ship's spy-glass, m folding contraption, be pijiied out and fo-J fo-J Went down to the edge "I was shipwrecked." heavy oar from the beached dinghy, waving it threateningly, holding the flaring lantern forward in the other hand. "I'm not hurting your things!" Lark screamed at him. "You be a girl, ben't you? What you doin' here?" He was quite near her now, a tall, unkempt young man. staring at her with deep-set unwelcoming unwel-coming eyes. "I was shipwrecked. I washed up here days ago. ... I I thought nobody would ever find me. I've been here days and nights such a long time." She tried to steady herself her-self against the trembling, sick relief re-lief flooding through her at the blessed bless-ed shock of another human presence. "That Tempora ship, I reckon." His speech was strange to Lark. He had a curious way of making the words, half-formed flat words. His wild brown hair hung almost to his shoulders. He looked lean and strong and angry, standing there in his disreputable dungarees and short torn and tattered jacket. "Yes." Lark said, "Yes, the Tern- pora." She knew she was going to cry, could feel the sob tearing itself' it-self' out of her. She sat down, bleakly, bleak-ly, in the sand and put her head in her arms, giving over to the thick, punishing sobs. "I'm sorry you-had to get washed In here. Pity you couldn't have been in that life-boat that come in. This is a mighty lonesome place' for a lone girl by herself." His voice was gentle now, kindly. His speech was easier, with less of the thick softness, the guttural pro- Lark said again, childishly. 1 didn't hurt your things. I did eat some of your biscuits. I suppose they were yours." Un was hungry." He sat down in the sand, opposite her, staring at her intently. "I'm glad un found 'em I never saw you' 8 back ' just somethin' movin', an' I was afraid Cony-" He broke off then went on. "My few things am much. I take shame for yelhn at un, like I did." That's all right." Lark could control con-trol herself now. could try to smile at this tall, gentle young man with e tragic eyes and the ha. -gentle half-almost savage way of speak ln"I'm Gait Withe. I'm bound servant serv-ant to Mag and Cony Vurney hat runs the inn over to the Peninsula He gestured off toward the cloudy we tried to help that smkm you could see the rockets Jtato. But it was a coastwise rlcane. Couldn't no small boat maK gry, lady. Have bread." "My name's Lark." Lark accepted accept-ed some bread and broke off some cheese. "Thank you. Gait. I am hungry. If it hadn't been for your biscuits I don't know what I'd have done." "I wish I'd guessed," he said simply, "that you were out here. I wish I had." He was speaking with a slow prideful care, watching her, waiting for her every word. They lay in the sand in the shade of the fog bushes and the stone wall and scrub pine A delightful sense of peace and rest stole over Lark. She closed her eyes. . When she awoke, startled, feeling the catch of the loneliness again, calling out for him, Gait said gently, gen-tly, "I watched un asleep, there, and I couldn't think to waken un. Un looked so happy like, and and so pretty. Lark. ... But we'd better think what to do. there's the best place to make for." "You'll take me to the inn," Lark said astonished, "won't you? When y0u go. ..- Why, Galt-Galt-" All her arguments, all her pleadings plead-ings and reasonings were lost on him He said, simply and stubbornly stubborn-ly "I don't aim to take you to the inn, Lark." He repeated it doggedly, dogged-ly, maddeningly. -I certainly don't aim to stay hf.re'" She mocked him, furiously, in hfs own thick half-gentle, half- Guinea way- (TO BE CONTINUED) m then and adjusted it 10 her vision, hoping that, m light of the late aft-t( aft-t( might be able to catch 1 W on the horizon. , yond the incoming break-! break-! floated a bale of hay, 4 to be a rifting steadily "ore. Lark watched it and then turned away It was growing dark P was beginning to be J the Io-eliness and by hunger. e acknowledged defeat Wouragrrnent and crept "We rock shelter where, ? we of the remaining y Pieces and eating it, finally curled up to tried to mound the sand d still keep her , lhe fog had come in and its clamminess was "C.hoa cold, dead hand, of the Moor. 'Umal, Lark burrowed I sana. Again and again tol lhe endIess njeht- ner cramped body JISatinE weight that Jened she was steam- Upland to the shade th. Wmle tn cooler I hJ1?65 Sh drar at iWi d0ep and lon' LJ ier trickle slowly down "roat. She walked in tting her bare feet |