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paused in her course for her crew to fish, as in the clear water a shoal of tunny had been seen, and the nets had been thrown in amidst it. The men hailed her in her boat, and asked her some questions as to the soundings and the coast; for there was a fog on the horizon, a white fog like a silver veil, and they thought it meant wind and water both, and they were strangers.

She answered them willingly, for she thought well of all sailors; and their skipper, a young fellow and handsome, whose first voyage it was on these seas, as he was of Palermo and had always traded eastward, pulled himself out to her in his long-boat, and threw into her little skiff some oranges and other fruit. As they were from a sailor she took them, and let him see her white shell-like teeth in a smile like sunshine in a storm. When she pulled her boat to shore, he pulled his too inland; and when she stepped through the shallow water and the sands, he stepped beside her.

He was very handsome, with a glowing, sun-warmed beauty, like one of his own Sicilian fruits. He was but twenty-three years of age; his heart was warm, and his head was hot. He said to her: