Sam pulled a dozen vigorous strokes, and the boat shot into the reach opposite Kit's House.
"That," she said, resting her eyes on the weather-stained front of Mr.Fogo's dwelling, "is where the hermit lives, is it not?
I should like to meet this man that hates all women." Sam essayed a gallant speech, but she paid no heed to it.
"What a charming creek that is, beyond the house! Let us row up there and wait for the others." The creek was wrapped in the first quiet of evening.

There was still enough tide to mirror the tall trees that bent towards it, and reflect with a grey gleam one gable of the house behind.

Two or three boats lay quietly here by their moorings; beside them rested a huge red buoy, and an anchor protruding one rusty tooth above the water.

Where the sad-looking shingle ended, a few long timbers rotted in the ooze.

Nothing in this haunted corner spoke of life, unless it were the midges that danced and wheeled over the waveless tide.
"Yonder lies the lepers' burial-ground," said Sam, and pointed.
"I have heard of them" (she shivered); "and that ?" She nodded towards the saddest ruin in this sad spot, the hull of what was once a queenly schooner, now slowly rotting to annihilation beside the further shore.