He is not my servant, except that he rents my husband's land." She paused again.
Caius would have urged that he had understood otherwise, or that hitherto he had not found O'Shea either civil or communicative; but it appeared that the lady had something more to say after her emphasis of pause, and when she said it Caius bid her good-day without making further excuse or justification.

She said: "I did not understand from O'Shea that he allowed you to walk on the sands without some one who would have warned you if there had been danger." When Caius was riding on his way, he experienced something of that feeling of exaltation that he had felt in the presence of his inexplicable lady-love.

Had he not proof at least now that she was no dream or phantasy, and more than that, that she inhabited the same small land with him?
These people knew her; nay (his mind worked quickly), was it not evident that she had been the link of connection between them and himself?
She knew him, then--his home, his circumstances, his address.
(His horse was going now where and how it would; the man's mind was confounded by the questions that came upon it pell-mell, none waiting for an answer.) In that other time when she had lived in the sea, and he had seen her from the desolate bit of coast, who was she?
Where had she really lived?
In what way could she have gained her information concerning him?
What could have tempted her to play the part of a fishy thing?
He remembered the monstrous skin that had covered her; he remembered her motion in the water.

Then he thought of her in the gray homespun dress, such as a maid might trip her garden in, as he had seen her travelling between the surf and the dune in the winter blast.

Well, he lived in an enchanted land; he had to deal with men and women of no ordinary stuff and make, but they acknowledged their connection with her.