"There's some one at the door, father," he heard her say. Instantly perceiving that it would not do to disappear and leave them alarmed, he stood where he was on the door-step. But he afterward remembered that the girl's voice showed merely surprise, and no trace of fear.
The figures disappeared from the room, he heard the scratch of a match, and presently footsteps approached the door. It opened to show the light of a shaking candle, the little man's peering face, smooth-shaven but lined with years, and over his narrow shoulders the face of the girl, alert, clear, large-eyed, in a dusky radiance of brown hair that glimmered in the uncertain light. Their shadows leaped and swung on the walls behind them. Dim eyes and bright, sharpened brows and serene, both fixed their sight on the burly young sailor-man before them.
"Who is it?" said the man, in a gentle voice.
Archer, who had easily met the hostile looks of the revelers in Black Harbor, was abashed before this girl.
