While he
waited, the voice suddenly ceased, and the song was replaced by the
sharp grating of a keel on the beach. Turning in the direction of this
sound, he perceived a boat being pushed out by invisible hands towards
the water's edge from a rocky cave, that jutted upon the Fjord, and,
full of curiosity, he stepped towards the arched entrance, when,--all
suddenly and unexpectedly,--a girl sprang out from the dark interior,
and standing erect in her boat, faced the intruder. A girl of about
nineteen, she seemed, taller than most women,--with a magnificent
uncovered mass of hair, the color of the midnight sunshine, tumbled over
her shoulders, and flashing against her flushed cheeks and dazzlingly
fair skin. Her deep blue eyes had an astonished and certainly indignant
expression in them, while he, utterly unprepared for such a vision of
loveliness at such a time and in such a place, was for a moment taken
aback and at a loss for words. Recovering his habitual self-possession
quickly, however, he raised his hat, and, pointing to the boat, which
was more than half way out of the cavern, said simply--
"May I assist you?"
She was silent, eyeing him with a keen glance which had something in it
of disfavor and suspicion.
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