"Sabrina tried to find comfort in these words. She let the young man walk her home to her parents' house, and there he told the same story again, and her family politely thanked him, then let him go home to his own folks.

"But Sabrina's family was not pleased. 'Who does Enoch think he is to expect our sister to live in the wild with him?' and 'I don't believe any of it--it's all lies,' said her brothers, and her mother confessed, 'I always did fear that boy would come to no good.' But her father only put his arm around Sabrina and consoled her by saying, "We can't say whether his plans are right or wrong until we know more. We'll just have to wait for word from him.'

"They waited all that next spring, and that summer, and into the autumn, and when winter came again, and they knew no word could reach them in those months because of the storms at sea, all their spirits fell, and in her heart, Sabrina began to doubt Enoch would return--she feared he might have died--that's what she told herself--that's what she almost hoped had happened, for the other possibility would have been just too much for her to bear.

"Now the other sailors who had been on Enoch's ship had gone out again that spring, but when the next winter came and ice froze along the shores so it was not safe for ships to sail, the sailors had nothing better to do but drink in the tavern, drink and talk, and the drink loosened their tongues so that they said things perhaps they should not have. That's when it came out--rumors that Enoch had gone native. When Sabrina's brothers heard these stories, they feared they must be true because Enoch's friend would have spoken out against such rumors if they were not, and soon Enoch's friend quit coming to the tavern, ashamed perhaps to have been friends with such a one as Enoch."

"What do you mean by 'gone native'?" Adele asked.