dozen piratical prahus escorted the white yacht a hundred miles upon her northward journey, firing a farewell salute with volley after volley from the little, brass six-pounders in their bows.
As the tiny fleet diminished to mere specks astern, disappearing beneath the southern horizon, a white flanneled man with close cropped blonde hair, and a slender, black haired girl in simple shirt waist and duck skirt watched them from the deck of the Priscilla.
An involuntary sigh escaped the lips of each, and they turned and looked into one another’s eyes.
“We are leaving a cruel world that has been kind to us,” said the man, “for with all its cruelties it gave us each other and reunited us when we were separated.”
“Will civilization be more kind?” asked the girl.
Thandar shook his head.
“I do not know,” he replied.
