Page:A Wild-Goose Chase - Balmer - 1915.djvu/255

Rh "Marry him?"

"Marry him."

"But," Eric cried, "there you found"

"That you had been there and gone and were to build cairns if you got to the islands south. We searched them week after week, but you hadn't got there. I couldn't show that you'd got there. He said that your own message proved you must be lost and he ordered the ship south. He said there was no use in our looking for you longer; that he'd filled his part of the bargain. So he claimed me."

"Claimed you?" Eric let her go and his eyes glowed.

"The men turned on him and refused to go back. Then he said I'd tricked him; that I meant to cheat him all along; that I used the men to force him to stay beyond his bargain. Eric, it was true; from his point of view it was true. I didn't care about anything else but finding you; I was afraid he might make the men go back. So I told him he'd done his part and I'd do mine; but he must stay and search longer, no matter how hopeless it was. Then he did."