He smiled again, tilting forward on his chair. "The Lady St. Columb," he said, "the spoilt darling of the Court. The Lady Dona who drinks in the London taverns with her husband's friends.
You are quite a celebrity, you know."
She found herself flushing scarlet, stung by the irony of his words, his quiet contempt.
"That's over," she said, "finished and done with."
"For the time being, you mean."
"No, forever."
He began whistling softly to himself, and reaching for his drawing continued to play with it, sketching in the background.
"When you have been at Navron a little while you will tire of it," he said, "and the smells and sounds of London will call to you again. You will remember this mood as a passing thing."
"No," she said.
But he did not answer, he went on with his drawing.
She watched him, stung with curiosity, for he drew well, and she began to forget she was his prisoner and that they should be at enmity with one another.
"That heron was standing on the mud, by the head of the creek," she said,
"I saw him, just now, before I came to the ship."
"Yes," he answered, "he is always there, when the tide ebbs.
It is one of his feeding grounds.
He nests some distance away though, nearer to Gweek, up the main channel.
What else did you see?"
"An oyster-catcher, and another bird, a curlew, I think it was."
"Oh, yes," he said, "they would be there too.
I expect the hammering drove them away."
"Yes," she said.
He continued his little tuneless whistle, drawing the while, and she watched him, thinking how natural it was, how effortless and easy, to be sitting here, in this cabin, on this ship, side by side with the Frenchman, while the sun streamed in through the windows and the ebb-tide bubbled round the stern.
It was funny, like, a dream, like something she had always known would happen, as though this was a scene in a play, in which she must act a part, and the curtain had now lifted, and someone had whispered:
"Here - this is where you go on."
"The night-jars have started now, in the evenings," he said, "they crouch in the hillside, farther down the creek.
They are so wary though, it's almost impossible to get really close."
"Yes," she said.
"The creek is my refuge, you know," he said, glancing up at her, and then away again.
"I come here to do nothing.
And then, just before the idleness gets the better of me, I have the strength of mind to tear myself away, to set sail again."
"And commit acts of piracy against my countrymen?" she said.
"And commit acts of piracy against your countrymen," he echoed.
He finished his drawing, and put it away, and then rose to his feet, stretching his arms above his head.
"One day they will catch you," she said.
"One day… perhaps," he said, and he wandered to the window in the stern, and looked out, his back turned to her.
"Come and look," he said, and she got up from her chair and went and stood beside him, and they looked down to the water, where there floated a great cluster of gulls, nosing for scraps.
"They come in dozens, always," he told her; "they seem to know at once when we return, and they come in here from the headlands.
My men will feed them, I can't prevent them.
And I am as bad myself. I am always throwing crumbs to them, from the windows here."
He laughed, and reaching for a crust of bread, he tossed it to them, and the gulls leapt upon it, screaming and fighting.
"Perhaps they have a fellow feeling for the ship," he said; "it is my fault for naming her La Mouette."
"La Mouette - the Sea-gull - why, of course," she said, "I had forgotten what it meant," and they went on watching the gulls, leaning against the window.
"This is absurd," Dona thought, "why am I doing this, it is not what I meant, not what I intended.
By now surely I should be bound with ropes and thrust into the dark hold of the ship, gagged and bruised, and here we are throwing bread to the sea-gulls, and I have forgotten to go on being angry."
"Why are you a pirate?" she said at last, breaking the silence.
"Why do you ride horses that are too spirited?" he answered.
"Because of the danger, because of the speed, because I might fall," she said.
"That is why I am a pirate," he said.
"Yes, but…"
"There are no 'buts.' It is all very simple really.