The Serpent's Shadow

that the sea stayed pleasantly calm—and then just a little more.

As Maya leaned out over the bow to see the bow wave pushing up, she suddenly exclaimed with surprise as a dolphin leaped out of the water just in front of her nose. The dolphin was swiftly joined by another, and another, until there was a school of twenty or more playing in the bow wave, leaping and gamboling in the water alongside. This, of course, was what Andrew and his boys saw, which to their minds would be enough to make a landlubber girl laugh and point. What Maya and Peter saw, however, was another matter.

Along with the dolphins had come the merfolk of the open ocean, the neriads, the tritons, the hippocampuses, all of whom (whatever they had been in the past) were now creatures of pure spirit to be seen only by those who had the special sight to do so. They were as clear and seemingly solid to Peter as the dolphins; they were probably less so to Maya, since they weren't of her Element, but she saw them well enough as they played among the very physical dolphins. She was enchanted, and the look on her face, her wide and shining eyes, the smile on her generous lips made his heart sing. The neriads winked and tossed their hair at him flirtatiously, but he only smiled at them briefly and returned his gaze to Maya—who laughed with delight at the swimming coquettes.

They finally came back into the harbor as sunset turned the sky to a blaze of crimson, and all of London was silhouetted against the fiery clouds, with the great dome of St Paul's looming over all. It was a sight perfect enough to make even Peter, seasoned sailor that he was, catch his breath. And Maya, completely enraptured, clasped her hands at her breast and drank it all in.

We'll do this again, he vowed to himself. Often. And I'll take her out alone one day, perhaps up near Scotland, and introduce her to the Selkie—

Too soon they nipped in to the dock; too soon Andrew threw the mooring rope to one of the hands on the wharf, and put out the plank. Maya said good-bye to all of them, shaking their hands and thanking each of them individually, and with such charm and warmth that even old Andrew blushed and allowed that it had been a pleasure.

Then they were safely on the dock again, and the boat moved out into the river, heading for its home dock nearer Thames mouth than this.

'Well?' he asked her. 'I hope you weren't too disappointed.'

'Disappointed!' She made a face at him. 'If you think that, you must be the stupidest man who ever lived! It was wonderful!'

'Even when your hat blew off and we had to fish it out with a gaff?' he teased.

'Bother the old hat!' Her eyes shone and her cheeks glowed with pleasure. 'This was worth a hundred hats! How can I ever thank you enough?'

He shrugged, and her eyes narrowed; she suddenly looked so impish that he wondered what she was thinking of.

Then, with no warning at all, she went on tiptoe and kissed him full on the mouth. And no little peck either —

'There!' she laughed. 'Does that convince you?'

It took him a moment to catch his breath and his wits. 'Ah—yes—' he managed.

'Good.' She took his arm firmly, and linked hers into it. 'Now, Captain Peter, will you be so kind as to escort your lady home?'

My lady? My lady? If the kiss had blown his wits to the four wits, her words blew them back. 'I would consider it the highest honor in the world, lady mine,' he replied to her manifest delight, and together they set off in search of a cab as the blue dusk enclosed them in their own little world.

MAYA drifted in through her front door in a kind of rosy fog, trailing her fingers along the wainscoting and humming to herself. The kiss with which she had thanked Peter—

Be honest, Miss Witherspoon. You ambushed him.

—all right, ambushing Peter had produced the result she had hoped for. He had held her arm all the way to the 'bus, held her hand on the 'bus (disregarding the arctic glares of two old ladies and the giggles of three nursemaids), and had kissed her right on