Looking towards the sand-hills, I saw the men-servants from out-of-doors, and the fisherman, named Yolland, all running down to us together; and all, having taken the alarm, calling out to know if the girl had been found.

In the fewest words, the Sergeant showed them the evidence of the footmarks, and told them that a fatal accident must have happened to her.

He then picked out the fisherman from the rest, and put a question to him, turning about again towards the sea: "Tell me," he said.

"Could a boat have taken her off, in such weather as this, from those rocks where her footmarks stop ?" The fisherman pointed to the rollers tumbling in on the sand-bank, and to the great waves leaping up in clouds of foam against the headlands on either side of us.
"No boat that ever was built," he answered, "could have got to her through THAT." Sergeant Cuff looked for the last time at the foot-marks on the sand, which the rain was now fast blurring out.
"There," he said, "is the evidence that she can't have left this place by land.

And here," he went on, looking at the fisherman, "is the evidence that she can't have got away by sea." He stopped, and considered for a minute.