That we all had known, and reckoned with, but we had not counted that our risk would be shared by a woman.

Ah I that luckless ride of Elspeth's! But for that foolish whim she would be safe now in the cool house at Middle Plantation, with a ship to take her to safety if the worst befell.

And now of all the King's subjects in that hour we were the most ill-fated, islanded on a sand heap with the tide of savage war hourly eating into our crazy shelter.
Before the daylight came, as I stood with my cheek to my musket, I had come to a resolution.

In a tangle of duties a man must seize the solitary clear one, and there could be no doubt of what mine was, I must try for the Tidewater, and I must try alone, Shalah had the best chance to get through, but without Shalah the stockade was no sort of refuge.

Ringan was wiser and stronger than I, but I thought I had more hill-craft, and, besides, the duty was mine, not his.