Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/243

 'What can you have to say? If it be what you said in the summer, you know that it is of no use to say it all again. I shall not come.'

'Let me put your boat up for you at the least,' said Sanctis, controlling whatever impatience he felt and having faith that patience soon or late prevailed with all women. 'Your shore folks must be very honest people that they have never stolen it from you.'

'It is not because they are honest, but because they are afraid of the Sasso Scritto. It has a bad name. There are sunken rocks and quaking sands about it. I know where they are, but they are always dangerous.'

As she spoke, she drew the rope over her shoulders and began to pull her boat upward.

Seeing that she was obdurate, Sanctis went behind the boat and pushed it and lifted it through the stones and the sand and the sea-grasses that choked the way.

'I have put it up every day that I have used it without help,' said Musa, angrily.

But he did not desist, and with the aid