Page:Curwood--The Courage of Captain Plum.djvu/187

 to him now. Marion would meet him at midnight. She would go with him to the boat, and then—ah, he had solved the problem! He would use no force. He would tell her that Neil was in his canoe half a mile out from the shore and that he had promised to leave the island for good if she would go out to bid him good-by. And once there, a half a mile or a mile away, he would tell her that he had lied to her; and he would give her his heart to trample upon to prove the love that had made him do this thing, and then he would row her to the mainland.

It was the sight of Obadiah's cabin that brought his caution back. He came upon it so suddenly that an exclamation of surprise fell unguarded from his lips. There was no light to betray life within. He tried the door and found it locked. He peered in at the windows, listened, and knocked, and at last concealed himself near the path, confident that the little old councilor was still at St. James. For an hour he waited. From the rear of Obadiah's home a narrow foot-