He was gone in a second, almost before she had had time to realise his flying presence; and the next moment passengers were streaming up on deck, asking questions, uttering surmises, on the verge of panic, yet trying to ignore the anxiety that tugged at their resolution.

Molly joined the crowd. She was frightened too, badly frightened; but it is always better to face fear in company. So at least says human instinct.

The passengers collected in a restless mass on the upper deck. The captain was seen going swiftly to the bridge. After a brief word with him the first-officer came down to them. He was a pleasant, easy-tempered man, and did not appear in the least dismayed.

"It's all right," he said, raising his voice. "Please don't be alarmed! There has been a little accident in the engine-room. The captain hopes you won't let it interfere with your dancing."

He placed himself in the thick of the strangely dressed crowd. His clean-shaven face was perfectly unconcerned.

"I'll come and join you, if I may," he said. "The captain allows me to knock off. Will you admit a non-fancy-dresser?"

He led the way below, calling for the orchestra as he went. The frightened crowd turned and followed as if in this one man who spoke with the voice of authority protection could be found. But they hung back from dancing, and after a pause the first-officer seized a banjo and proceeded to entertain them with comic songs. He kept it up for a while, and then Mrs. Langdale went nobly to his assistance and sang some Irish songs. One or two other volunteers presented themselves, and the evening's entertainment developed into a concert.

The tension relaxed considerably as the time slipped by, but it did not wholly pass. It was noticed that the doctor was absent.

A reluctance to disperse for the night was very manifestly obvious.

About two hours after the first alarm the great ship thrilled as if in answer to some monster touch. The languid roll ceased. The engines started again firmly, regularly, with gradually rising speed. In less than a minute all was as it had been.

A look of intense relief shot across the first-officer's quiet face.

"That means 'All's well,'" he said, raising his voice a little. "Let us congratulate ourselves and turn in!"

"There has been danger, then, Mr. Gresley?" queried Mrs. Granville, a lady who liked to know everything in detail.

Mr. Gresley laughed with an indifference perfectly unaffected. "I believe the engineers thought so," he said. "I must refer you to them for particulars. Anyhow, it's all right now. I am going to tell the steward to bring coffee."

He got up leisurely and strolled away.

There was a slight commotion on the other side of the door as he opened it, a giggle that sounded rather hysterical. A moment later Lady Jane Grey; her head-gear gone, her shorn curls looking absurdly frivolous, walked mincingly into the saloon and subsided upon the nearest seat. She was attended by Captain Fisher, who looked anxious.

"Such a misfortune!" she remarked, in a squeaky voice that sounded, somehow, a horrible strain. "I have been shut up in the Tower and have only just escaped. I trust I am not too late for my execution. I'm afraid I have kept you all waiting."

All the heaviness of misgiving passed out of the atmosphere in a burst of merriment.

"Where on earth have you been hiding?" shouted Major Granville. "I believe you have been playing the fool with us, you rascal."

"I!" cried Charlie. "My dear sir, what are you thinking of? If you were to breathe such a suspicion as that to the captain he would clap me in irons for the rest of the voyage."

"You have been in the engine-room for all that," said Mrs. Langdale, whose powers of observation were very keen. "Look at your skirt!"

Charlie glanced at the garment in question. It was certainly the worse for wear. There were some curious patches in the front that had the appearance of oil stains.

"That'll be all right!" he said cheerfully. "I had a fright and tumbled upstairs. Skirts are beastly awkward things to run away in, aren't they, Mrs. Langdale? Well, good-night all! I'm going to bed."

He got up with the words, grinned at everyone collectively, picked up the injured skirt with exaggerated care, and stepped out of the saloon.

Mrs. Langdale looked after him, half-laughing, yet with a touch of concern.

"He looks queer," she remarked to Molly, who was standing by her. "Quite white and shaky. I believe something has happened to him. He has hurt himself in some way."

But Molly was feeling peculiarly indignant at that moment, though not on account of her ruined skirt.

"He's a silly poltroon!" she said with emphasis, and walked stiffly away.

Charlie Cleveland had recovered from his serious fit even sooner than she had thought possible; and, though she had made it sufficiently clear to him that as a serious suitor he was utterly unwelcome, she was intensely angry with him for having so swiftly resumed his customary gay spirits.

IV

"Come! What happened last evening? We want to know," said Major Granville, in his slightly overbearing manner. "I saw you with the second engineer this morning, Fisher. I'm sure you have ferreted it out."

"I am not at liberty to pass on my information," responded Fisher stolidly. "You wouldn't understand it if I did, Major. There was danger and there was steam. Two of the engineers had their arms scalded, and one of the stokers was badly hurt. I can't tell you any more than that."

"Do you go so far as to say that the ship herself was in danger?" asked Major Granville. He was talking loudly, as was his wont, across the smoking saloon.

"I should say so," said Fisher, without lifting his eyes from the magazine he was deliberately studying.

"Where is young Cleveland this morning?" asked the Major abruptly.

Fisher shrugged his shoulders.

"He was in his bunk when I saw him last. Heaven knows what he may be up to by now."

Charlie Cleveland strolled in at this juncture. He had his right arm in a sling.

"Hullo!" he said. "How are you all? I'm on the sick-list to-day. I sprained my wrist when I fell up the steps yesterday."

Fisher glanced at him for a moment over the top of his magazine and resumed his reading in silence.

"Look here, my friend!" he said. "You were in the thick of this engine business. I am sure of it."

"I was," said Charlie readily. "But for me you would all be at the bottom of the sea by this time."

He threw himself into a chair with a broad grin at Major Granville's contemptuous countenance and took up a book.

Major Granville looked intensely disgusted. It was scarcely credible that a passenger could have penetrated to the engine-room and interfered with the machinery there, yet he more than half believed that this outrageous thing had actually occurred. He got up after a brief silence and stalked stiffly from the saloon.

Charlie banged down his book with a yell of laughter.

"Didn't I tell you, Fisher?" he cried. "He's gone to have a good, square, face-to-face talk with the captain. But he won't get anything out of him. I've been there first."

He went up on deck and found a party of quoit-players. Molly Erle was among them. Charlie stood and watched, yelling advice and encouragement.

"Looking on as usual?" the girl said to him presently, with a bitter little smile, as she found herself near him.

He nodded.

"I'm really afraid to speak to you to-day," he said. "Your skirt will never again bear the light of day."

"What happened?" she said briefly.

The game was over, and they strolled away together across the deck.

"I'll tell you," he said, with ill-suppressed gaiety in his voice. "We should all have been blown out of the water last night if it hadn't been for me. Forgetful of my finery, I went and—looked on. The magic result was that I saved the situation, and—incidentally, of course—the ship."

He stopped.

"You don't believe me?" he said abruptly.

Her lip curled a little.

"Do you really expect to be believed?" she said.

"I don't know," he said; "I thought it was the usual thing to do between friends."

"I was not aware—" began Molly.

He broke in with a most disarming smile.

"Oh, please," he said. "I don't deserve that—anyhow. I'm awfully sorry about the skirt. I hope you'll let me bear the cost of the damage. I've got into hot water all round. Nobody will believe I'm seriously sorry, though it's a fact for all that. Don't be hard on me, Molly, I say!"

There was a note of genuine pleading in the last words that induced her to relent a little.

"Oh, well, I'll forgive you for the skirt," she said. "I suppose boys can't help being mischievous, though you are nearly old enough to know better."

She looked at him as she said it. His face was comically penitent. Somehow she could not quarrel with the lurking smile in his merry eyes. He was certainly a boy. He would never be anything else. But Molly did not realise this, and she was still too young herself to have appreciated the gift of perpetual youth had she been aware of its existence.

"That's right!" said Charlie cheerily. "And perhaps"—he spoke cautiously, with a half-deprecatory glance at her bright face—"perhaps—in time, you know—you will be able to forgive me for something else as well."

"I think the less we say about that the better," remarked Molly, tilting her chin a little.

"All right!" said Charlie equably. "Only, you know"—his voice was suddenly grave—"I was—and am—in earnest."

Molly laughed.

"So far as in you lies, I suppose?" she said indifferently. "I wonder if you ever really did anything worth doing in your life, Mr. Cleveland."

"I wish you would call me Charlie!" he said impulsively. "Yes. I proposed to you last night. Wasn't that worth doing?"

She drew her brows together in a quick frown, but she made no reply. Fisher was drifting towards them. She turned deliberately, her head very high, and strolled to meet him.

Charlie glanced over his shoulder, stood a moment irresolute, then walked away more soberly than usual towards the bridge, where he was a constant and welcome visitor.

V

"There are plenty of fine chaps in the world who aren't to be recognised as such at first sight," drawled Bertie Richmond to his young cousin, Molly Erle, who was sitting with her feet on the fender on a very cold winter evening.

"I'm sure of that," said Mrs. Richmond from the other side of the fire, with a tender glance at her husband's loosely knit figure. "I never thought there was an inch of heroism in you, Bertie darling, till that day when we went punting and we got upset. How brave you were! I've never forgotten it. It was the beginning of everything."

"It sounds as if it were nearer being the end," remarked Molly, who systematically avoided all sentiment. "I don't believe myself that any man can be actually heroic and yet not betray it somehow."

"You're wrong," said Bertie.

"I don't think so," said Molly. She could be quite as obstinate as most women, and this was a point upon which she was very decided.

"I'll prove it," said Bertie, with quiet determination. "There's a chap coming with the crowd of sportsmen to-morrow who is the bravest and, I think, the best fellow I ever met. I shan't tell you who he is. I'll leave you to find out—if you can. But I don't believe you will."

"I am quite sure I can tell the difference between a looker-on, a mere loafer, and a man who does," said Molly, with absolute confidence.

"Bet you you don't!" murmured Bertie Richmond, smiling at the ceiling. "I know the woman's theory so jolly well."

Molly smiled also.

"I'll take your bet, whatever it is, Bertie," she said.

Bertie shook his head.

"No, I don't bet on a dead cert," he said comfortably. "I'll even tell you the fellow's heroic deeds, and then you'll never spot him. I met him first in South Africa. He saved my life twice. Once he carried me nearly a mile under fire, and got wounded in the process. Another time he sat all night under fire holding a fellow's artery. Since then he has been knocking about in odd corners, doing splendid things in the dark, as it were, for he is horribly modest. The last I heard of him was from my friend Captain Raglan. He travelled on Raglan's ship from Calcutta, One night in the Mediterranean something went wrong in the engine-room. Two of the boat's engineers were badly scalded. They managed to get away, but a wretched stoker was too hurt to escape, and this fellow—this hero of mine—went down into a perfect inferno and got him out. Not only that, he went back afterwards with one of the engineers to direct him, and worked like a bull till the mischief was put right. There was danger of an explosion every moment, but he never lost his nerve for an instant. When it was over everyone concerned was sworn to secrecy, and not a passenger on board that boat knew what had actually taken place. As I said before, he is not the sort of chap anyone would credit with that sort of heroism. I shan't tell you what he is like in other respects."

"I probably know," said Molly. "I came home on Captain Raglan's ship in the autumn."

"What! You were on board?" exclaimed Bertie. "What a rum go! You will meet one or two old friends, then. And the hero is probably known to you already, though I'm sure you have never taken him for such."

"Oh, you're quite wrong!" laughed Molly. "I have known him and detected his splendid qualities for quite a long while. He is nice, isn't he? I am glad he is coming."

She took up her book with slightly heightened colour, and began to turn over its pages.

Bertie Richmond stared at her in silence for some moments.

"Well!" he said at last. "You have got sharper insight than any woman I know."

"Thanks!" said Molly, with an indifferent laugh. "But you are not so awfully great on that point yourself, are you, Bertie? I should say you are scarcely a competent judge."

Mrs. Richmond protested on Bertie's behalf, but without effect. Molly was slightly vexed with him for imagining that she could be so dull.

VI

The great country house was invaded by a host of guests on the following day. Portmanteaux and gun-cases were continually in evidence. The place was filled to overflowing.

Mrs. Langdale, who was Mrs. Richmond's greatest friend, arrived in excellent spirits, and was delighted to find Molly Erle a fellow-guest.

"And actually," she said, "Charlie Cleveland and Captain Fisher are going to swell the throng of sportsmen. We shall imagine ourselves back in our old board-ship days. Charlie was talking about them and of all the fun we had only last Saturday. Yes, I have seen him several times lately. He has been staying in town, waiting for something to turn up, he says. Funny boy! He is just as gay as ever. And Captain Fisher, whom he dragged to my flat to tea, is every bit as heavy and uninteresting, poor dear!"

"I don't call Captain Fisher uninteresting," remarked Molly. "At least, I never found him so in the old days."

"My dear, he is heavy as lead!" declared Mrs. Langdale. "I believe he only opened his mouth once to speak, and then it was to ask for five lumps of sugar instead of three. A most wearing person to entertain. I will never have him at my table without Charlie to raise the gloom. He and Charlie seemed to have decided to join forces for the present. They spent Christmas together with Captain Fisher's people. I don't know if they are as sober as he is. If so, poor dear Charlie must have felt distinctly out of his element. But his spirits are wonderful. I believe he would make a tombstone laugh."

"It will be nice to see him again," said Molly tolerantly. "It is three months now since we dispersed."

She made the remark with another thought in her mind. Surely by this Charlie would have forgotten the folly that had caused her annoyance in the old days! Constancy was the very last quality with which she credited him. Or so at least she thought.

She went for a walk on the rocky shore that afternoon, meeting the steely north-east blast with a good deal of resolution, if scant enjoyment. Something in the immediate future she found vaguely disquieting, something connected with Charlie Cleveland.

She did not believe that her estimate of this young man was in any way wide of the mark. And yet the thought of meeting him again had in it a disturbing element for which she could not account. It worried her a good deal that wild afternoon in January. Perhaps a suspicion that she had once done young Cleveland an injustice strengthened the unwelcome sense of regret, for it felt like regret in her mind.

Yet as she turned homeward along the windy shore one comforting reflection came to her and remained with her. She was at least unfeignedly glad that Captain Fisher was going to be there. She liked those silent, strong men who did all the hard work and then stood aside to let the tide of praise and admiration flood past.

Right well did her cousin's description fit this quiet hero, she told herself with flushed cheeks.

She remembered how he had spoken of him as "doing splendid things in the dark, as it were," as being "horribly modest." Fisher's heavy personality came before her with the memory. She could detect the heroism behind the grave exterior with which this man baffled all others.

If Charlie had been a hero, too, instead of a frivolous imp of mischief!

A sigh rose in her heart. Somehow, even though she told herself she had no interest in the matter, Molly wished that he were something more valuable than the flippant looker-on she took him to be. How could any man, who was worth anything, bear to be only that, she wondered?

She found a large party gathered in the hall at tea on her return. A laugh she knew fell on her ears as she entered, and an instant later she was aware of Charlie springing to meet her, his brown face aglow with the smile of welcome.

"How awfully good to meet you here, Molly!" he said, with that audacious use of her Christian name against which no protest of hers seemed to take any effect.

She shook hands with him and she tried to do it coldly, but his warm grasp was close and lingering. She realised with something of a shock that he really was as glad as he professed to be to see her again.

She went forward to the group around the fire and shook hands with all she knew.

Captain Fisher was the last to receive this attention. He was standing in the background. He moved forward half a pace to greet her. In his own peculiar, dumb fashion he also seemed pleased to meet her there.

He had an untasted cup of tea in his hand which he hastened to pass on to her.

"I shouldn't accept it if I were you," laughed Mrs. Langdale. "I saw ten lumps of sugar go into it just now."

Fisher raised his eyebrows, but made no verbal protest. He never spoke if a gesture would do as well.

Molly accepted the cup of tea with a gracious smile, and Fisher found her a chair and sat silently down beside her.

Molly had plenty to say at all times. Her companion did not embarrass her by his lack of responsiveness as he embarrassed most people. She had a feeling that his reticence did not spring from inattention.

"I am going to let you have the Silent Fish, as Charlie calls him, for partner at dinner," her hostess said to her later. "You are a positive marvel, Molly. He becomes quite genial under your influence."

Fisher brightened considerably when he found himself allotted to Molly. He even conversed a little, and went so far as to seek her out in the drawing-room later.

Charlie, who was making tracks in the same direction, turned sharply away when he saw it, and went off to the billiard-room where several of the rest were collected playing pool. He was in uproarious spirits, and the whole gathering was speedily infected thereby.

The evening ended in a boisterous abandonment to childish games, and the party broke up at midnight, exhausted but still merry. Charlie, after an animated sponge-fight with half-a-dozen other sportsmen, finally effaced himself by bolting into Fisher's bedroom and locking himself in.

To Fisher, who was smoking peacefully by the fire, he made hurried apology, to which Fisher gruffly responded by requesting him to get out.

But Charlie, after listening to the babel dying away down the corridor, turned round with a smile and established himself at comfortable length on Fisher's bed.

"I want to talk to you, dear old fellow," he tenderly remarked. "Can you spare me a few moments of your valuable time?"

"Two minutes," said Fisher with brevity.

"By Jove! What generosity!" ejaculated Charlie, his hands clasped behind his head, his eyes on the ceiling. "It's rather a delicate matter. However, here goes! Do you seriously mean business, or don't you? Are you in sober earnest, or aren't you? Are you badly smitten, or are you only just beginning to hover round the candle? Pardon my mixture of similes! The meaning remains intact."

Silence followed his somewhat involved speech. After a pause Captain Fisher got up slowly, and turned round to face the boy on his bed.

"Whatever your meaning may be, I don't fathom it," he said curtly.

Charlie rolled on to his side to look at him.

"Dense as a London fog," he murmured.

"You'd better go," said Fisher, dropping his cigarette into the fire and beginning to undress.

Charlie sat up and watched him with an air of interest. Fisher took no more notice of him. There was no waste of ceremony between these two.

Charlie got up at last and laid sudden hands on his friend's square shoulders.

"I think it wouldn't hurt you to give me a straight answer, old boy," he said, a flicker of something that was not mischief in his eyes.

Fisher faced him instantly.

"What is it you want to know?" he inquired bluntly.

"This only," Charlie said, with perfect steadiness. "Are you going in for Miss Erle in solid earnest or are you not? I want to know your intentions, that's all."

"I can't enlighten you, then," returned Fisher.

Charlie laughed without effort.

"Cautious old duffer!" he said. "Well, tell me this! I've no right to ask it. Only somehow I've got to know. You care for her, don't you?"

Fisher looked at him keenly for a moment. "Why do you ask?" he said.

"Oh, it's infernal impertinence, of course. I admit that," said Charlie, his tanned face growing suddenly red. "I suspected it, you see, ages ago—on board ship, in fact. Is it true, then?"

Fisher turned abruptly from him, and began to wind his watch with extreme care. He spoke at length with his back turned on Charlie, who was waiting with extraordinary patience for his answer.

"Yes," he said deliberately. "It is true."

"Go on and prosper!" said Charlie with a gay laugh. "You have my blessing, old chap. Thanks for telling me!"

He moved up to Fisher and thrust out an immense brown paw.

"Take a friend's advice, man!" he said. "Ask her soon!"

Then he bounced out of the room with his usual brisk energy, and shut the door noisily behind him.

VII

Was it by happy accident or by some kind friend's deliberate provision that Fisher found himself walking alone with Molly Erle to church on the following Sunday? Across the frosty park the voices of the other churchgoers sounded fitfully distinct.

Charlie Cleveland and another boy called Archie Croft, as hare-brained as himself, were making Mrs. Langdale slide along the slippery drive. Mrs. Langdale's laughter could be plainly heard. Molly thought her, privately, rather childish to suffer herself to be thus carried away.

Her companion was sauntering very slowly at her side.

"I think we are late," Molly presently remarked, in a suggestive tone.

"Are we?" said Fisher. "Does it matter?"

"Yes," said Molly with decision. "I don't like going in after the service has begun."

"We won't," said Fisher.

She looked at him in some surprise and found him gravely watching her.

"I don't think we ought to do that," she remarked, smiling a little.

"I'll go with you to-night," said Fisher, "if you will come with me now."

They had come to a path that branched off towards the shore. He stopped with an air of determination.

Molly stopped too, looking irresolute. Her heart was beating very fast. She wished he would turn his eyes away.

Suddenly he took his hand from his pocket and held it out to her.

"Come with me, Miss Erle!" he said, in a quiet tone.

She hesitated momentarily, then as he waited she put her hand in his.

She glanced up at him as she did so, her face a glow of colour.

"How far, Captain Fisher?" she said faintly.

"All the way," said Fisher, with a sudden smile that illuminated his sombre countenance like a searchlight on a dark sea.

Molly laughed softly.

"How far is that?" she said.

He drew the little hand to his breast and put his free arm round her.

"Further than we can see, Molly," he said, and his quiet voice suddenly thrilled. "Side by side through eternity."

Thus, with no word of love, did Fisher the Silent take to himself the priceless gift of love. And the girl he wooed loved him the better for that which he left unuttered.

They returned home late for lunch, entering sheepishly, and sitting down as far apart as the length of the table would allow.

Charlie fell upon Fisher with merciless promptitude.

"You base defaulter!" he cried. "I'll see you march in front next time. I was never more scandalised in my life than when I realised that you and Molly had done a slope."

Fisher shrugged the shoulder nearest to him and offered no explanation of his and Molly's defection.

Charlie kept up a running fire of chaff for some time, to which Fisher, as was his wont, showed himself to be perfectly indifferent. Lunch over, Molly disappeared. Charlie saw her go and turned instantly to Fisher.

"Come and have a single on the asphalt court!" he said. "I haven't tried it yet. I want to."

Fisher was reluctant, but yielded to persuasion.

They went off together, Charlie with an affectionate arm round his friend's shoulders.

"I am to congratulate, I suppose?" he asked, as they crossed the garden to the tennis-court.

Fisher looked at him gravely, a hint of suspicion in his eyes.

"You may, if it gives you any pleasure to do so, my boy," he said.

"Ah, that's good!" said Charlie. "You're a jolly good fellow, old chap. You'll make her awfully happy."

"I shall do my best," Fisher said.

Charlie passed instantly to less serious matters, but the critical look did not pass entirely from Fisher's face. He seemed to be watching for something, for some card that Charlie did not appear disposed to play.

Throughout the hard set that followed, his vigilance did not relax; but Charlie played with all his customary zest. Tennis was to him for the time being the only thing worth doing on the face of the earth. In his enthusiasm he speedily stripped off his coat and rolled his sleeves to the shoulder as if it had been the hottest summer day.

At the end of the set, which Charlie won, a couple of spectators who had come up unseen applauded their energy, and Charlie, swinging round in flushed triumph, raced up for a word with his host and Molly Erie.

"I can't stuff over a fire all the afternoon," he said. "But the light is getting bad, isn't it? Fisher and I will have to knock off. Are you two going for a walk? We'll come, too, if you are, eh, Fisher?"

He turned towards Fisher, who had come up, and held out his hand for the other's racquet.

Molly uttered a sudden startled exclamation.

"Why, Charlie," she ejaculated, "what have you done to your arm? What is the matter with it?"

Charlie jumped at her startled tone and tore down his shirt-sleeve hastily.

"An old wound," he said, with a shame-faced laugh.

She put her gloved hand swiftly on his to stay his operations.

"No, tell me!" she said. "What is it—really? How was it done?"

"You will never get him to tell you that," laughed Bertie Richmond. "You had better ask Fisher."

"Oh, rats!" cried Charlie vehemently. "Fisher, I'll break your head with this racquet if you give my show away. Come along! I believe the moon has contracted a romantic habit of rising over the sea when the sun sets. Let's go and——"

"I'll tell you, Molly," broke in Bertie, linking a firm arm in Charlie's to keep him quiet. "He can't break his host's head, you know. It's a scald, eh, Charlie? He got it in the engine-room of the Andover one night in the autumn. You were on board, you know. Help me to hold him, Fisher! He's getting restive. But I thought you knew all about it, Molly. You told me so."

"Oh, I didn't know—this!" the girl said. "How could I? I never guessed—this!"

Her three listeners were all surprised by the tragic note in her voice. There was a momentary silence. Then Charlie made a fierce attempt to wrest himself free.

"You infernal idiots!" he exclaimed violently. "Fisher, if you interfere with me any more I—I'll punch your head! Bertie, don't be such a fool!"

He shook them off with an angry effort. Fisher laughed quietly.

"You can't always hide your light, my dear fellow," he observed. "If you will do impossible things, you will have to put up with the penalty of being occasionally found out."

"Silly ass!" commented Bertie. "Anyone would think that to save a few hundred human lives was a thing to be ashamed of. It was the same thing in South Africa; always slinking off into the background when the work was done, till everyone took you for nothing but a looker-on—a chap who ought to wear the V.C., if ever there was one," he ended, thrusting an arm through Charlie's, as the latter, having put on his coat, turned once more towards them.

"Oh, you are utterly wrong," the boy said forcibly, almost angrily. "If you judge a man by what he does on impulse you might decorate the biggest blackguard in the world with the V.C."

"You're made of impulse, my dear lad," Bertie remarked, walking off with him. "You're a mass of impulse. That's why you do such idiotic things."

Charlie yielded, chafing, to the friendly hand.

"I should like to kick you, Bertie," he said.

But he went no further than that. Bertie Richmond was his very good friend, and he was Bertie's. Neither of them was likely to forget that fact.

VIII

"Oh, Charlie, here you are! I am glad!"

Molly entered the smoking-room with an air of resolution. She had just returned from evening church with Fisher. They were late, and the latter had gone off to dress forthwith.

But Molly had glanced into the smoking-room, and, seeing Charlie alone there, as she had half hoped but scarcely expected, she entered.

Charlie sprang up instantly, his brown face exceedingly alert.

"Come to the fire!" he said hospitably.

Molly went, but did not sit down. She stood facing him on the hearth-rug. Her young face was very troubled.

"I want to tell you," she said steadily, "how sorry—and grieved—I am for all the hard things I have said and thought of you. I would like to retract them all. I was quite wrong. I took you for an idler—a buffoon almost. I know better now. And I—I should like you to forgive me."

Her voice suddenly faltered. Her eyes were full of tears she could neither repress nor conceal.

Charlie, however, seemed to notice nothing strained in the atmosphere. He broke into a gay laugh and held out his hand.

"Oh, that's all right," he said briskly. "Shake hands and forget what those asses said about me! You were quite right, you know. I am a buffoon. There isn't an inch of heroism anywhere about me. You took my measure long ago, didn't you? To change the subject, I'm most awfully pleased to hear that you and old Fisher have come to an understanding. Congratulate you most heartily. There's solid worth in that chap. He goes straight ahead and never plays the fool."

He looked straight at her as he spoke. Not by the flicker of an eyelid did he seem to recall the fact that he had once asked on his own behalf that which he apparently so heartily approved of her bestowing upon another.

Yet Molly, torn with remorse over what was irrevocable, did a most outrageous thing.

"Charlie!" she cried, with a deep ringing passion that would not be suppressed. "Why have I been deceived like this? Why didn't you tell me? How could you let me imagine anything so false?" She flung out her other hand to him and he took it; but still he laughed.

"Oh, come, Molly!" he protested. "I did tell you, you know. I told you the day after it happened. Don't you remember? I had to account for the skirt."

She wrenched her hands away from him. The thrill of laughter in his voice seemed to jar all her nerves. She was, moreover, wearied with the emotions of the day.

"Oh, don't you see," she cried passionately, "how different it might have been? If you had told me—if you had made me understand! I could have cared—I did care—only you seemed to me—unworthy. How could I know? What chance had I?"

She bowed her head suddenly, and burst into a storm of bitter weeping.

Charlie turned white to his lips. He stood perfectly motionless till the anguished sobbing goaded him beyond endurance. Then he flung round with a jerk.

"Stop, for Heaven's sake!" he exclaimed harshly. "I can't bear it. It's too much—too much."

He moved close to her, his face twitching, and took her shaking shoulders between his hands.

"Molly!" he said almost violently. "You don't know what you said just now. You didn't mean it. It has always been Fisher—always, from the very beginning."

She did not contradict him. She did not even answer him. She was sobbing as in passionate despair.

And it was that moment which Fisher chose for poking his head into the smoking-room in search of Charlie, whom he expected to find dozing over the fire, ignorant of the fact that it was close upon dinner-time.

Charlie leapt round at the opening of the door, but Fisher had taken stock of the situation. He entered with that in his face which the boy had never seen there before—a look that it was impossible to ignore.

Charlie met Fisher half-way across the room.

"Come into the billiard-room!" he said hurriedly.

He seized Fisher's arms with muscular fingers.

"Not here," he whispered urgently. "She is tired—upset. There is nothing really the matter."

But Fisher resisted the impulsive grip.

"I will talk to you presently," he said. "You clear out!"

He pushed past Charlie and went straight to the girl. His jaw was set with a determination that would have astonished most of his friends.

"What is it, Molly?" he said, halting close beside her. "What is wrong, child?"

But Molly could not tell him. She turned towards him indeed, laying an imploring hand on his arm; but she kept her face hidden and uttered no word.

It was Charlie who plunged recklessly into the opening breach—plunged with a wholesale gallantry, regardless of everything but the moment's emergency.

"It's my doing, Fisher," he declared, his voice shaking a little. "I've been making an ass of myself. It was, partly your fault, too—yours and Bertie's. Let her go! I'll explain."

He was excited and he spoke quickly, but his eyes were very steady.

"Molly," he said, "you go upstairs! You've got to dress, you know, and you'll be late. I'll make it all right. Don't you worry yourself!"

Molly lifted a perfectly white face and looked at Fisher. She met his eyes, struggled with herself a moment, then with quivering lips turned slowly away. He did not try to stop her. He realised that Charlie must be disposed of before he attempted to extract an explanation from her.

Charlie sprang to the door, shut it hastily after her, and turned the key.

"Now!" he said, and, wheeling, marched straight back to Fisher and halted before him. "You want an explanation. You shall have one. You gave my show away this afternoon. You made her imagine that in taking me for an ordinary—or perhaps I should say a rather extraordinary—fool she had done me an injustice. She came in her sweetness and told me she was sorry. And I—forgot myself, and said things that made her cry. That is the whole matter."

"What did you say to her?" demanded Fisher.

"I'm not going to tell you."

"You shall tell me!" said Fisher.

He took a step forward, all the hidden force in him risen to the surface.

Charlie faced him for a second with his head flung defiantly back, then, as Fisher laid a powerful hand on his shoulder, he stuck his hands in his pockets and smiled a little.

"No, old chap," he said. "I'll apologise to you, if you like. But you haven't any right to ask for more."

"I have a right to know why what you said upset her," Fisher said.

Charlie shook his head.

"Not the smallest," he said. "But I should have thought your imagination might have accomplished that much. Surely you needn't grudge the tears of pity a woman wastes over a man she has had to disappoint?"

He spoke with his eyes on Fisher's face. He was not afraid of Fisher, yet his look of relief was unmistakable as the hand on his shoulder relaxed.

"You care for her, then?" Fisher said.

Charlie flung impetuously away from him.

"Oh, need we discuss the thing any further?" he said. "I'm on the wrong side of the hedge, and that's enough. I hope you won't say any more to her about it. You will only distress her."

He walked to the end of the room and came slowly back to Fisher, whose eyes were sternly fixed upon him. He thrust out his hand impulsively.

"Forgive me, old chap!" he said. "After all, I've got the hardest part."

Fisher's face softened.

"I'm sorry, boy," he said, and took the proffered hand.

"I'll clear out to-morrow," Charlie said. "You'll forget this foolery of mine?" gripping Fisher's hand hard for a moment.

Fisher did not answer him. He struck him instead a sounding blow on the shoulder, and Charlie turned away satisfied. He had played a difficult game with considerable skill. That it had been a losing game did not at the moment enter into his calculations. He had not played for his own stakes.

IX

"Jove! It's a wild night," said Archie Croft comfortably, as he stretched out his legs to the smoking-room fire. "What's become of Charlie? He doesn't usually retire early."

"I don't believe he has retired," said Bertie Richmond sleepily. "I saw him go out something over an hour ago."

"Out?" said Croft. "What on earth for?"

"Up to some fool trick or other, no doubt," said Fisher from the smoking-room sofa.

"Hullo, Fisher! I thought you were asleep," said Bertie. "You ought to be. It's after midnight. Time we all turned in if we mean to start early with the guns to-morrow."

Croft stretched himself and rose leisurely.

"It's a positively murderous night!" he remarked, strolling to the window. "There must be a tremendous sea."

He drew aside the blind, staring at the blackness that seemed to press against the pane. A moment later, with a sharp exclamation, he ripped back the blind and flung the window wide open. An icy spout of rain and snow whirled into the room. Richmond turned round to expostulate, but was met by a face of such wild excitement that his protest remained unuttered.

"I saw a rocket!" Croft declared.

"Oh, rats!" murmured Fisher.

"It isn't rats!" he said indignantly. "It's a ship down among those infernal rocks. I'm off to see what's doing."

"Hi! Wait a minute!" exclaimed his host, starting up. "You are perfectly certain, are you, Croft? No humbug? I heard no report."

"Who could hear anything in a gale like this?" returned Croft impatiently. "Yes, of course, I am certain. Are you coming?"

"I must send a man on horseback to the life-boat station," said Bertie, starting towards the door. "It's two miles round the headland. They may not know there is anything up."

He was out of the room with the words. The rest of the men in the smoking-room followed. Fisher remained to shut the window. He stood a couple of seconds before it, facing the hurricane. The night was like pitch. The angry roar of the sea half-a-mile away surged up on the tearing gale like the voice of a devouring monster. He turned away into the cosy room and followed the others.

The whole party went out into the raging night. They groped their way after Bertie to the stables. A groom was dispatched on horseback to the life-boat station. Lanterns were then procured, and, with the blast full in their teeth, they fought their way to the shore.

Here were darkness and desolation unspeakable. The tide was high. Great waves, flashing white through the darkness, came smiting through the rocks as if they would rend the very surface of the earth apart. The clouds scurrying overhead uncovered a star or two and instantly drew together in impenetrable darkness.

Down by the sea-wall that protected the little village nestling between the cliffs and the sea they found a knot of men and women. A short distance away in the boiling tumult there shone a shifting light, but between it and the shore the storm-god held undisputed possession.

"That's her!" explained one of the men to Bertie Richmond. "She's sunk right down in them rocks, sir. It's a little schooner. I see her masts a-stickin' up just now."

The man was one of his own gardeners. He yelled his information into Bertie's ear with great enjoyment.

"Have you sent to the lifeboat chaps?" shouted Bertie.

"Young gentleman went an hour ago," came the answer. "But they are off on another job to Mulworth, t'other side of the station. He wanted us to go out in a fishing-boat. But no one 'ud go. He be gone for a bit o' rope now. You see, sir, them rocks 'ud dash a boat to pieces like a bit o' eggshell. There's only three chaps aboard as far as we could see awhile ago. And not a hundred yards off us. But it's a hundred yards of death, as you might say. No boat could live through it. It ain't worth the trying."

A hundred yards of death and only three little human lives to be gained by the awful risk of braving that hundred yards!

Bertie turned away, feeling sick, yet silently agreeing. Who could hope to pass unharmed through that raging darkness, that tossing nightmare of great waters? Yet the thought of those three lives beating outward in agony and terror while he and his friends stood helplessly by took him by the throat.

Suddenly through a lull of the tempest there came a great shout.

The clouds had drifted asunder and a few stars shone vaguely down on the wild scene. The dim light showed the doomed vessel wedged among the rocks that stuck up, black and threatening, through the racing foam.

Nearer at hand, huddled on the stout sea-wall, stood the little group of watchers, their faces all turned outwards towards the two masts of the little schooner, which remained faintly discernible through the shifting gloom.

It was not more than a hundred yards away, Bertie realised. Yet the impossibility of rescue was as apparent as if it had been a hundred miles from land. He fancied he could see a couple of figures half-way up one of the masts, but the light was elusive. He could not be certain of this.

Suddenly a hand gripped his elbow, and he found Archie Croft beside him, yelling excitedly.

"Don't let him go!" he bawled. "It's madness—sheer madness!"

Bertie turned sharply. Close to him, his head bare, and clothed still in evening dress, stood Charlie Cleveland. A coil of rope lay at his feet. He had knotted one end firmly round his body.

"Listen, you fellows!" he cried. "I'm going to have a shot at it. Pay out the rope as I go. Count up to five hundred, and if it is limp, pull it in again. If it holds, make it fast! Got me?"

He turned at once to a flight of iron steps that led off the wall down into the awful, seething water. But someone, Fisher, sprang suddenly after him and held him back. Charlie wheeled instantly. The light of a lantern striking on his face revealed it, unafraid, even laughing.

"You silly ass!" he cried. "Hang on to the rope instead of behaving like a fellow's grandmother!"

"You shan't do it!" Fisher said, holding him fast. "It is certain death!"

"All right," Charlie yelled back. "I choose death, then. I prefer it to sitting still and seeing others die. My life is my own. I choose to risk it."

He looked at Fisher closely for a moment, then, with one immense effort, he wrenched himself away. He went leaping down the steps as a boy going for a summer-morning dip.

Fisher turned round and met Bertie Richmond hurrying to help him.

"Let him go!" Fisher said briefly.

Thereafter came a terrible interval of waiting. The sky was clearing, but the tempest did not abate. The rope ran out with jerks and pauses. Fisher stood and counted at the head of the steps, his eyes on the tumult that had swallowed up the slight active figure of the one man among them all who had elected to risk his life against those overwhelming odds.

"He must be dashed to pieces!" Bertie Richmond gasped to himself, with a shudder.

The rope ceased to run. Fisher had counted four hundred and fifty. He counted on resolutely to five hundred, then turned and raised his hand to the men who held the coil. They hauled at the rope. It was limp. Hand over hand they dragged it in through the foam. Fisher peered downwards. It came so rapidly that he thought it must have parted among the rocks. Then he saw a dark object bobbing strangely among the waves. He went down the steps, that quivered and trembled like cardboard under his feet.

Clinging to the iron rail, he reached out a hand and guided the rope to him. A great sea broke over him and nearly swept him off. He saved himself by hanging with both hands on to the rope. Thus he was dragged up the steps to safety, and behind him, buffeted, bleeding, helpless, came two limp bodies lashed fast together.

They cut the two asunder by the light of the lanterns, and one of them, Charlie, staggered to his feet.

"I've got to go back!" he gasped. "You pulled too soon. There are two others."

He dashed the blood from his face, seized a pocket flask someone held out to him, and drained it at a long gulp.

"That's better!" he said. "That you, Fisher? Good-bye, old chap!"

The first pale light of a rising moon burst suddenly through the cloud drift.

"I'll go myself," Fisher abruptly said.

Even in that roar of sound they heard the boyish laugh that rang out upon the words.

"No, no, no!" shouted Charlie. "Bless you, dear fellow! But this is my job—alone. You've got to stay behind—you're wanted."

He stood a few seconds poising himself on the steps, drawing deep breaths in preparation for the coming struggle. The moonlight smote upon him. He lifted his face to it, and seemed to hesitate. Then suddenly he turned to Fisher and laid impetuous hands upon his shoulders.

"Lookers-on see most of the game," he said. "And I've been one from the first, though I own I thought at one time I should like to take a hand. Go on and prosper, old boy! You've played a winning game all along, you know. You're a better chap than I am, and it's you she really cares for—always has been. That's how I came to know what I'd got to do. I find it's easy—thank God!—it's very easy."

And with that he plunged down again into the breakers. The tide was on the turn. The worst fury was over. The awful darkness had lifted.

Those who mutely watched him fancied they heard him laugh as he met the crested waves.

X

Molly had spent a night of feverish restlessness. It was with a feeling of relief that she answered a tap that came at her door in the early dusk of the January morning; but she gave a start of surprise when she saw Mrs. Langdale enter.

She started up on her elbow.

"Oh, what is it? It has been a fearful night. Has something dreadful happened?" she cried.

Mrs. Langdale's usually merry face was pale and quiet. She went quickly to the girl's side and took her hands into a tight clasp.

"My dear," she said, "Gerald Fisher asked me to come and tell you. There has been a wreck in the night. A vessel ran on to the rocks. There were three men on board. They could not reach them with an ordinary boat, and the life-boat was not available."

"Go on!" gasped Molly, her eyes on her friend's face.

Mrs. Langdale went on, with an effort.

"Charlie Cleveland—dear fellow—went out to them with a rope. He reached them, brought one safely back, returned for the others—and—and—" Her voice failed. Her hands tightened upon Molly's; they were very cold. "He managed to get to them again," she whispered, "but—the rope wasn't long enough. He unlashed himself and bound them together. They pulled them ashore—both living. But—he—was lost!"

The composure suddenly forsook Mrs. Langdale's face. She hid it on Molly's pillow.

"Oh, Molly, that darling boy!" she cried, with a burst of tears. "And they say he went to his death—laughing."

"He would," Molly said, in a strange voice. "I always knew he would."

She lay back again. Her face was suddenly pinched and grey, but she felt not the smallest desire to cry.

"I wonder why!" she presently said. "How I wonder why!"

Mrs. Langdale recovered herself with an effort. The frozen voice seemed to give her strength.

"Have we any right to ask that?" she whispered. "No one on this side can ever know."

"Oh, I think you are wrong," Molly said. "We can't be meant to grope in outer darkness."

Mrs. Langdale whispered something about "those the gods love." She was too broken-down herself to be able to offer any solid comfort.

After a painful silence she got up and busied herself with reviving Molly's fire, which had almost gone out. She felt as she had felt only once before in her life, and that had been ten years previously, when her only child had died suddenly. She wished passionately that she were back in Calcutta with her husband. She hated the bleak English winter, the cruel English seas.

Molly lay quite still for some time, her young face drawn and stricken.

At length she got up and went to the window. It was a morning of bleak winds and shifting clouds. The sea was just visible, very far and dim and grey. She stood a long while gazing stonily out.

"Can I get you anything, darling?" said Mrs. Langdale's voice softly behind her.

"No, thank you," the girl said, without turning. "Please leave me; that's all!"

And Mrs. Langdale crept away through the hushed house to her own apartment, there to lay down her head and cry herself exhausted. Dear, gallant Charlie! Her heart ached for him. His irrepressible gaiety, his reckless generosity, these had become the attributes of a hero for ever in her eyes.

After a while her hostess came to her, pale and tearful, to beg her, if she possibly could, to show herself at the breakfast table. Captain Fisher had repeatedly asked for her, she said; and he seemed very uneasy.

Mrs. Langdale rose, washed her face, and made an effort to powder away the evidence of her grief. Then she went bravely down and faced the silent crowd in the breakfast room. No one was eating anything. The very air smote chill and cheerless as she entered. As if he had been lying in wait for her, Fisher pounced upon her on the threshold.

"I must speak to you for a moment," he said. "Come into the smoking-room!"

Mrs. Langdale accompanied him without a word.

"How is she?" he demanded, almost before they entered. "How did she take it?"

There was something about Fisher just then with which Mrs. Langdale was wholly unacquainted. He was alert, impatient, almost feverish. She answered him with brevity.

"I think she is stunned by the news."

He began to pace to and fro with heavy restlessness.

"Ask her to come to me if she is up!" he said at length. "Tell her—tell her not to be afraid! Say I am waiting for her. I must see her."

Mrs. Langdale hesitated.

"She asked me to leave her alone," she said irresolutely.

Fisher wheeled swiftly round.

"I don't think she will refuse to see me," he said. "At least try!"

There was entreaty in his voice, urgent entreaty, which Mrs. Langdale found herself unable to withstand.

She departed therefore on her thankless errand and Fisher flung himself down at the table with his face buried in his hands. In this room but a few short hours ago Charlie had faced and turned away his anger with all the courage and sweetness which, combined, had made of him the hero he was.

It seemed to Fisher, looking back upon the interview, that the boy had done a braver thing, had offered a sacrifice more splendid, there, in that room, than any he had done or offered a little later down on the howling shore.

There came a slight sound at the door and Fisher jerked himself upright. Molly had entered softly. She was standing, looking at him with a strange species of wonder on her white face. He rose instantly and went to meet her.

"I have something to give you, Molly," he said. She raised her eyes questioningly.

"It was brought to me," he said, controlling his voice to quietness with a strong effort, "after Mrs. Langdale went to tell you of—what had happened. I wish to give it to you myself. And—afterwards to ask you a question."

"What is it?" Molly asked, with a sudden sharp eagerness.

"A note," Fisher said, and gave her a folded paper. "It was found on his dressing-table, addressed to you. His servant brought it to me."

Molly's hand trembled as she took the missive.

Fisher turned away from her, and stood before the window in dead silence. There was a long, quiet pause. Then a sudden sound made him swing swiftly round and stride to the door to turn the key. The next moment he was stooping over Molly, who had sunk down on the hearth-rug and was sobbing terrible, anguished sobs.

He lifted her to a chair with no fuss of words, and knelt beside her, stroking her hair, comforting her, with something of a woman's tenderness.

Molly suffered him passively, and the first wild agony of her trouble spent itself unrestrained on his shoulder. Then she grew calmer, and presently begged him in a whisper to read the message which Charlie had left behind him.

For a moment Fisher hesitated; then, as she repeated her desire, he took up the scrawl and deliberately read it through. It had evidently been written immediately after his interview with the writer.

"Dear Molly," the note said, "It's all right with Fisher, so don't you worry yourself! I clear out to-morrow, so that there may be no awkwardness, but we haven't quarrelled, he and I. Forget all about this business! It's been a mistake from start to finish. I ought to have known that I was only fit to be a looker-on when I fell at the first fence. You put your money on Fisher and you'll never lose a halfpenny! I'm nothing but a humble spectator, and I wish you—and him also—the best of luck. If I might be permitted, to offer a little, serious, fatherly advice, it would be this:

"Don't let yourself get dazzled by the outside shine of any man's actions! A man isn't necessarily a hero because he doesn't run away. It is the true-hearted, steady-going chaps like Fisher who keep the world wagging. They are the solid material. The others are only a sort of trimming stuck on for effect and torn off when the time comes for something new. So marry the man you love, Molly, and forget that anyone else ever made a fool of himself for your sweet sake!

"Your friend for ever,

"Charlie."

Thus ended, with a simplicity sublime, the few words of fatherly advice which as a legacy this boy had left behind him.

Fisher laid the note reverently aside and spoke with a great gentleness.

"Tell me, dear," he said, "will it make it any easier for you if I go away? If so—you have only to say so."

The words cost him greater resolution than any he had ever uttered. Yet he said them without apparent effort.

Molly did not answer him for many seconds. Her head drooped a little lower.

"I have been—dazzled," she said at last, and there was a piteous quiver in her voice. "I do not know if I shall ever make you understand."

"You need never attempt it, Molly," he answered very steadily. "I make no claim upon you. Simply, I am yours to keep or to throw away. Which are you going to do?"

He paused for her answer. But she made none. Only in her trouble it seemed to him that she clung to his support.

He drew her a little closer to him.

"Molly," he said very tenderly, "do you want me, child? Shall I stay?"

And at length she answered him, realising that it was to this man, hero or no hero, she had given her heart.

"Yes, stay, Gerald!" she whispered earnestly. "I want you."

* * *

Perhaps he understood her better than she thought. Perhaps Charlie's last words to him had taught him a wisdom to which he had not otherwise attained. Or perhaps his love was large enough to cover and hide all that might be lacking in that which she offered to him.

But at least neither then nor later did he ever seek to know how deeply the glamour of another man's heroism had pierced her heart. She tried to whisper an explanation, but he hushed the words unuttered.

"It is all right, child," he said. "I am satisfied. It is only the lookers-on who are allowed to see all the cards. I think when we meet him again he will tell us that we played them right."

There was a deep quiver in his voice as he spoke, but there was no lack of confidence in his words. Looking upwards, Molly saw that his eyes were full of tears.



* * * * *

THE SECOND FIDDLE

A low whistle floated through the slumbrous silence and died softly away among the sand-dunes.

The man who sat in the little wooden summer-house that faced the sea raised his head from his hand and stared outwards. The signal had scarcely penetrated to his inner consciousness, but it had vaguely disturbed his train of thought. His eyes were dull and emotionless as he stared across the blue, smiling water to the long, straight line of the horizon. They were heavy also as if he had not slept for weeks, and there were deep lines about his clean-shaven mouth.

Before him on the rough, wooden table lay a letter—a letter that he knew by heart, yet carried always with him. The writing upon it was firm and regular, but unmistakably a woman's. It began: "Dear Hugh," and it ended: "Yours very sincerely," and it had been written to tell him that because he was crippled for life the writer could no longer entertain the idea of sharing hers with him.

There had been a ring enclosed with the letter, but this he had not kept. He had dropped it into the heart of a blazing fire on the day that he had first been able to move without assistance. He had not done it in anger. Simply the consciousness of possessing it had been a pain intolerable to him. So he had destroyed it; but the letter he had kept through all the dreary months that had followed that awful time. It was all that was left to him of one whom he had loved passionately, blindly, foolishly, and who had ceased to love him on the day, now nearly a year ago, when his friends had ceased to call him by the nickname of Hercules, that had been his from his boyhood.

And this was her wedding-day—a day of entrancing sunshine, of magic breezes, of perfect June.

He was picturing her to himself as he sat there, just as he had pictured her often—ah, often—in the old days.

From his place near the altar he watched her coming towards him up the great, white-decked church. Her eyes were shining with unclouded happiness. Behind her bridal veil he caught a glimpse of the exquisite beauty that chained his heart. Straight towards him the vision moved, and he—he braced himself to meet it.

A sharp pang of physical pain suddenly wrung his nerves, and in a moment the vision had passed from his eyes. He groaned and once more covered his face. Yes, it was her wedding-day. She was there before the altar in all the splendour of her youth and her loveliness. But he was alone with his suffering, his broken life, and the long, long, empty years stretching away before him.

He awoke to the soft splashing of the summer tide, out beyond the sand-dunes, and he heard again the clear, low whistle which before had disturbed his dream.

He remained motionless, and a dim, detached wonder crossed his mind. He had thought himself quite alone.

Again the whistle sounded. It seemed to come from immediately below him. Slowly and painfully he raised himself.

The next instant an enormous Newfoundland dog rushed panting into his retreat and proceeded to search every inch of the place with violent haste. The man on the bench sat still and watched him, but when the animal with a sudden, clumsy movement knocked his crutches on to the floor and out of his reach, he uttered an exclamation of annoyance.

The dog gave him a startled glance and continued his headlong investigation. He was very wet, and he left a trail of sea water wherever he went. Finally he bounded out as hurriedly as he had entered, and Hugh Durant was left a prisoner, the nearest of his crutches a full yard away.

He sat and stared at them with a heavy frown. His helplessness always oppressed him far more than the pain he had to endure. He cursed the dog under his breath.

"Oh, I am sorry!" a voice said suddenly some seconds later. "Let me get them for you!"

Durant looked round sharply. A brown-faced girl in a short, cotton dress stood in the doorway. Her head was bare and covered with short, black, curly hair that shone wet in the sunshine. Her eyes were very blue. For some reason she looked rather ashamed of herself.

She moved forward barefooted and picked up Durant's crutches.

"I'm sorry, sir," she said again. "I didn't know there was any one here till I heard Caesar knock something down."

She dusted the tops of the crutches with her sleeve and propped them against the table.

"Thanks!" said Durant curtly. He was not feeling sociable—he could not feel sociable—on that day of all days in his life's record.

Yet, as if attracted by something, the girl lingered.

"It's lovely down on the shore," she said half shyly.

"No doubt," said Durant, and again his tone was curt to churlishness.

Then abruptly he felt that he had been unnecessarily surly, and wondered if he was getting querulous.

"Been bathing?" he asked, with a brief glance at her wet hair.

She gave him a quick, friendly smile.

"Yes, sir," she said; and added: "Caesar and I."

"Fond of the sea, eh?" said Durant.

The soft eyes shone, and the man, who had been a sailor, told himself that they were deep-sea eyes.

"I love it," the girl said very earnestly.

Her intensity surprised him a little. He had not expected it in one who, to judge by her dress, must be a child of the humble fisher-folk. His interest began to awaken.

"You live near here?" he questioned.

She pointed a brown hand towards the sand-dunes.

"On the shore, sir," she said. "We hear the waves all night."

"So do I," said Durant, and his voice was suddenly sharp with a pain he could not try to silence. "All night and all day."

She did not seem to notice his tone.

"You live in the cottage on the cliff?" she asked.

He nodded.

"I came last week," he said. "I hadn't seen the sea for nearly a year. I wanted to be alone. And—so I am."

"All alone?" she queried quickly.

He nodded again.

"With my servant," he said. He repeated with a certain doggedness: "I wanted to be alone."

There was a pause. The girl was standing in the doorway. Her dog was basking in the sunshine not a yard away. She looked at the cripple with thoughtful eyes.

"I live alone, too," she said. "That is—Caesar and I."

That successfully aroused Durant's curiosity.

"You!" he said incredulously.

She put up her hand with a quick movement and pushed the short curls back from her forehead.

"I am used to it," she said, with an odd womanly dignity. "I have been practically alone all my life."

Durant looked at her closely. She spoke in a very low voice, but there were rich notes in it that caught his attention.

"Isn't that very unusual for a girl of your age?" he said.

She smiled again without answering. A blue sunbonnet dangled on her arm. In the silence that followed she put it on. The great dog arose at the action, stretched himself, and went to her side. She laid her hand on his head.

"We play hide-and-seek, Caesar and I," she said, "among the dunes."

Durant took his crutches and stumbled with difficulty to his feet. The lower part of his body was terribly crippled and weak. Only the broad shoulders of the man testified to the splendid strength that had once been his, and could never be his again as long as he lived. He saw the girl turn her head aside as he moved. The sunbonnet completely hid her face. A sharp spasm of pain set his own like a stone mask.

Suddenly she looked round.

"Will you—will you come and see me some day?" she asked him shyly.

Her tone was rather of request than invitation, and Durant was curiously touched. He had a feeling that she awaited his reply with eagerness.

He smiled for the first time.

"With pleasure," he said courteously, "if the path is easy and the distance not too great for my powers."

"It is quite close," she said readily, "hardly a stone's throw from here—a little wooden cottage—the first you come to."

"And you live quite alone?" Durant said.

"I like it best," she assured him.

"Will you tell me your name?" he asked.

"My name is Molly," she answered quietly.

"Nothing else?" said Durant with a puzzled frown.

"Nothing else, sir," she said, with her air of womanly dignity.

He made no outward comment, but inwardly he wondered. Was this odd little, dark-haired creature some nameless waif of the sea brought up on the charity of the fisher-folk, he asked himself.

She stood aside for him to pass, drawing Caesar out of his way. He stopped a moment to pat the dog's head. And so standing, leaning upon his crutches, he suddenly and keenly looked into the olive-tinted face that the sunbonnet shadowed.

"Sorry for me, eh?" he said, and he uttered a laugh that was short and very bitter.

She bent down over the dog.

"Yes, I am sorry," she said, almost under her breath.

Bending lower, she picked up something that lay on the ground between them.

"You dropped this," she said.

He took it from her with a grim hardening of the mouth. It was the letter he had received from his fiancee a year ago. But his eyes never left the face of the girl before him.

"I wonder—" he said abruptly, and stopped.

There was a pause. The girl waited, her hand nervously caressing the Newfoundland's curls. She did not raise her eyes, but the lids fluttered strangely.

"I wonder," Durant said, and his voice was suddenly kind, "if I might ask you to do something for me."

She gave him a swift glance.

"Please do!" she murmured.

"This letter," he said, and he held it out to her.

"I should like it torn up—very small."

She took the envelope and hesitated. Durant was watching her. There was unmistakable mastery in his eyes.

"Go on!" he said briefly.

And with a quick, startled movement, she obeyed. The letter fluttered around them both in tiny fragments. Hugh Durant looked on with a hard, impassive face, as he might have looked on at an execution.

The girl's hands were shaking. She glanced at him once or twice uncertainly.

When the work of destruction was accomplished she made him a nervous curtsey and turned to go.

Durant's face softened a second time into a smile.

"Thank you—Molly," he said, and he put his hand to his hat though she was not looking at him.

And afterwards he stood among the fragments of his letter and watched till both the girl and the dog were out of sight.

Twenty-four hours later Hugh Durant stood on the sandy shore and tapped with his crutch on the large, flat stone that was set for a step on the threshold of the little, wooden cottage behind the sand dunes.

He had reached the place with much difficulty, persevering with a doggedness characteristic of him; and there were great drops on his forehead though the afternoon was cloudy and cool.

A quick step sounded in answer to his summons, and in a moment his hostess appeared at the open door.

"Why didn't you come straight in?" she said hospitably.

She was dressed in lilac print. Her sleeves were turned up to the elbows, and she wore a big apron with a bib. He noticed that her feet were no longer bare.

He took off his hat as he answered.

"Perhaps I might have been tempted to do so," he said, "if I had felt equal to mounting the step without assistance."

"Oh!" She pulled down her sleeves hastily. "Will you let me help you?" she suggested shyly.

Durant's eyes were slightly drawn with pain. Nevertheless they were very friendly as he made reply.

"Do you think you can?" he said.

She took his hat from him with an anxious smile, and then the crutch that he held towards her.

"Tell me exactly what to do!" she said in her sweet, low voice. "I am very strong."

"If I may put my arm on your shoulder," Durant said, "I think it can be managed. But say at once if it is too much for you!"

Her face was deeply flushed as she bent from the step to give him the help he needed.

"Bear harder!" she said, as he leant his weight upon her. "Bear much harder!"

There was an odd little quiver in her voice, but, slight as she was, she supported him with sturdy strength.

The door opened straight into the tiny cottage parlour. A large wicker chair, well cushioned, stood in readiness. As Durant lowered himself into it, he saw that the girl's eyes were brimming with tears.

"I've hurt you!" he exclaimed.

"No, no!" she said, and turned quickly away. "You didn't bear nearly hard enough."

He laughed a little, though his teeth were clenched.

"You're a very strong woman, Molly," he said.

"Oh, I am," she answered instantly. "Now shall you be all right while I go to fetch tea?"

"Of course," he said. "Pray don't make a stranger of me!"

She disappeared into the room at the back of the cottage, and he was left alone. The great dog came in with stately stride and lay down at his feet.

Durant sat and looked about him. There was little to attract the eye in the simple furnishing of the tiny room. There was a small bookcase in one corner, but it was covered by a red curtain. Two old-fashioned Dutch figures stood on the mantelpiece on each side of a cheap little clock that seemed to tick at him almost resentfully. The walls were tinted green and bore no pictures or decoration of any sort. There was a plain white tablecloth on the table, and in the middle stood a handleless jug filled with pink and white wild roses, freshly gathered. There was no carpet. The floor was strewn with beach sand.

All these details Durant took in with keen interest. Nothing could have exceeded the simplicity of this dwelling by the sea. There had obviously been no attempt at artistic arrangement. Cleanliness and a neatness almost severe were its only characteristics.

"I hope you like toasted scones, sir," said Molly's voice in the doorway.

He looked round to see her come forward with the tea-tray.

"Nothing better," he said lightly, "particularly if you have made them yourself."

She set down her tray and smiled at him. Her short, curling hair gave her an almost elfish look.

"I've been so busy getting ready," she said childishly. "I've never had a gentleman to tea before."

"That is a very great honour for me," said Durant.

Molly looked delighted.

"I think the honour is mine," she said in her shy voice. "I am just going to fetch the wooden chair out of the kitchen."

She departed hastily as if embarrassed, and Durant smiled to himself. It was wonderful how the oppression had been lifted from his spirit since his meeting with this lonely dweller on the shore.

When Molly reappeared, he saw that she had assumed a dignity worthy of the occasion. She sat down behind the brown teapot with a serious face. He waited for her to lead the conversation, and the result was complete silence for some seconds.

Then she said suddenly:

"Have you been sitting in the summer-house again?"

"No," said Durant.

"I am glad of that," said Molly.

"Why?" he asked.

She hesitated.

"Isn't it rather a lonely place?" she said.

He smiled faintly.

"You know I came here to be lonely, Molly," he said.

"Yes; you told me," said Molly, and he fancied that he heard her sigh.

"Are you never lonely?" he asked in a kindly tone.

"Often," she said. "Often."

She was pouring the tea as she spoke. Her head was slightly bent.

"And so you took pity on me?" said Durant.

She shook her head suddenly and vigorously.

"It wasn't that, sir," she said in a very low voice. "I—I wanted—someone—to speak to."

"I see," said Durant gently. He added after a moment: "Do you know, I am glad I chanced to be that someone."

She smiled at him over the teapot.

"You weren't pleased—at first," she said. "You were angry. I heard you saying—"

"What?" said Durant.

He looked across at her and laughed naturally, spontaneously, for the first time.

Molly had forgotten to be either embarrassed or dignified.

"I don't know what it was," she said; "I only know what it sounded like."

"And that made you want to speak to me?" said Durant.

The brown face opposite to him looked impish. Yet it seemed to him that there was sadness in her eyes.

"It didn't frighten me away," she said.

"It would need to be a very timid person to be frightened at me now," said Hugh Durant quietly.

She opened her eyes wide, and looked as if she were about to protest. Then, changing her mind, she remained silent.

"Yes," he said. "Please say it!"

She shook her head without speaking.

But he persisted. Something in her silence aroused his curiosity.

"Am I really formidable, Molly?" he asked.

She rose to take his empty cup, and paused for a moment at his side, looking down at him.

"I don't think you realise how strong you are," she said enigmatically.

He laughed rather drearily.

"I am gauging my weakness just at present," he said.

And then, glancing up, he saw quick pain in her eyes, and abruptly turned the conversation.

Later, when he took his leave, he stood on her step and looked out to the long, grey line of sea with a faint, dissatisfied frown on his face.

"You're not afraid—living here?" he asked her at the last moment.

"What is there to fear?" said Molly. "I have Caesar, and there are other cottages not far away."

"Yes, I know," he said. "But at night—when it's dark—"

A sudden glory shone in the girl's pure eyes.

"Oh, no, sir," she said. "I am not afraid."

And he departed, hobbling with difficulty up the long, sandy slope.

At the top he paused and looked out over the grey, unquiet sea. The dissatisfaction on his face had given place to perplexity and a faint, dawning wonder that was like the birth of Hope.

* * *

During the long summer days that followed, that strange friendship, begun at the moment when Hugh Durant's life had touched its lowest point of suffering and misery, ripened into a curiously close intimacy.

The girl was his only visitor—the only friend who penetrated behind the barrier of loneliness that he had erected for himself. He had sought the place sick at heart and utterly weary of life, desiring only to be left alone. And yet, oddly enough, he did not resent the intrusion of this outsider, who had openly told him that she was sorry.

She visited him occasionally at his hermitage, but more frequently she would seek him out in his summer-house and take possession of him there with a winning enchantment that he made no effort to resist. Sometimes she brought him tea there; sometimes she persuaded him to return with her to her cottage on the shore.

The embarrassment had wholly passed from her manner. She was eager and ingenuous as a child. And yet there was something in her—a depth of feeling, a concentration half-revealed—that made him aware of her womanhood. She was never confidential with him, but yet he felt her confidence in every word she uttered.

And the life that had ebbed so low turned in the man's veins and began to flow with a steady, rising surge of which he was only vaguely conscious.

Molly had become his keenest interest. He had ceased to think with actual pain of the woman who had loved his strength, but had shrunk in horror from his weakness. His bitterness had seemed to disperse with the fragments of her torn letter. It was only a memory to him now—scarcely even that.

"This place has done me a lot of good," he said to Molly one day. "I have written to my friend Gregory Mountfort to come and see me. He is my doctor."

She looked up at him quickly. She was sitting on her doorstep and the August sunlight was on her hair. There were wonderful glints of gold among the dark curls.

"Shall you go away, then?" she asked.

"I may—soon," he said.

She was silent, bending over some work that she had taken up. The man looked down at the bowed head. The old look of perplexity, of wonder, was in his eyes.

"What shall you do?" he said abruptly.

She made a startled movement, but did not raise her eyes.

"I shall just—go on," she said, in a voice that was hardly audible.

"Not here," he said. "You will be lonely."

There was an unusual note of mastery in his voice. She glanced up, and met his eyes resolutely for a moment.

"I am used to loneliness," she said slowly.

"But you don't prefer it?" he said.

She bent her head again.

"Yes, I prefer it," she said.

There followed a pause. Then abruptly Durant asked a question.

"Are you still sorry for me?" he said.

"No," said Molly.

He bent slightly towards her. Movement had become much easier to him of late.

"Molly," he said very gently, "that is the kindest thing you have ever said."

She laughed in a queer, shaky note over her work.

He bent nearer.

"You have done a tremendous lot for me," he said, speaking very softly. "I wonder if I dare ask of you—one thing more?"

She did not answer. He put his hand on her shoulder.

"Molly," he said, "will you marry me?"

"No," said Molly under her breath.

"Ah!" he said. "Forgive me for asking!"

She looked up at him then with that in her eyes which he could not understand.

"Mr. Durant," she said, steadily, "I thank you very much, and it isn't—that. But I can only be your friend."

"Never anything more, Molly?" he said, and he smiled at her, very gently, very kindly, but without tenderness.

"No, sir," Molly said in the same steady tone. "Never anything more."

* * *

"Well," said Gregory Mountfort on the following day, "this place has done wonders for you, Hugh. You're a different man."

"I believe I am," said Hugh.

He spoke with his eyes upon a bouquet of poppies and corn that had been left at his door without any message early that morning. It was eloquent to him of a friendship that did not mean to be lightly extinguished, but his heart was heavy notwithstanding. He had begun to desire something greater than friendship.

"Physically," said Mountfort, "you are stronger than I ever expected to see you again. You don't suffer much pain now, do you?"

"No, not much," said Durant.

He turned to stare out of his open window at the sunlit sea. His eyes were full of weariness.

"Look here," the doctor said. "You're not an invalid any longer. I should leave this place if I were you. Go abroad! Go round the world! Don't stagnate any longer! It isn't worthy of you."

Hugh Durant shook his head.

"It's no good trying to float a stranded hulk, dear fellow," he said. "Don't attempt it! I am better off where I am."

"You ought to get married," his friend returned brusquely. "You weren't created for the lonely life."

"I shall never marry," Durant said quietly.

And Mountfort was disappointed. He wondered if he were still vexing his soul over the irrevocable.

He had motored down from town, and in the afternoon he carried his patient off for a thirty-mile spin. They went through the depths of the country, through tiny villages hidden among the hills, through long stretches of pine woods, over heather-covered uplands. But though it did him good, Durant was conscious of keenest pleasure when, returning, they ran into view of the sea. He felt that the shore and the sand-dunes were his own peculiar heritage.

Mountfort steered for the village scattered over the top of the cliff. Durant had persuaded him to remain for the night, and he had to send a telegram. They puffed up a steep, winding hill to the post-office, and the doctor got out.

"Back in thirty seconds," he said, as he walked away.

Hugh was in no hurry. It was a wonderfully calm evening. The sea looked like a sheet of silver, motionless, silent, immense. The tide was very low. The sand-dunes looked mere hummocks from that great height. Myriads of martens were circling about the edge of the cliff, which was protected by a crazy wooden railing. He sat and watched them without much interest. He was thinking chiefly of that one cottage on the shore a hundred feet below, which he knew so well.

He wondered if Molly had been to the summer-house to look for him; and then, chancing to glance up, he caught sight of her coming towards him from the roadside. At the same instant something jerked in the motor, and it began to move. It was facing up the hill, and the angle was a steep one. Very slowly at first the wheels revolved, and the car moved straight backwards as if pushed by an unseen hand.

Hugh realised the danger in a moment. The road curved sharply not a dozen yards behind him, and at that curve was the sheer precipice of the cliff. He was powerless to apply the brakes, and he could not even throw himself out. The sudden consciousness of this ran through him piercing as a sword-blade.

In every pulse of his being he felt the intense, the paralysing horror of violent death. For the first awful moment he could not even call for help. The sensation of falling headlong backwards gripped his throat and choked his utterance.

He made a wild, ineffectual movement with his hands. And then he heard a loud cry. A woman's figure flashed towards him. She seemed to swoop as the martens swooped along the face of the cliff. The car was running smoothly towards that awful edge. He felt that it was very near—horribly near; but he could not turn to look.

Even as the thought darted through his brain he saw Molly, wide-eyed, frenzied, clinging to the side of the car. She was in the act of springing on to it, and that knowledge loosened his tongue.

He yelled to her hoarsely to keep away. He even tried to thrust her hands off the woodwork. But she withstood him fiercely, with a strength that agonised and overcame. In a second she was on the step, where she swayed perilously, then fell forward on her hands and knees at his feet.

The car continued to run back. There came a sudden jerk, a crash of rending wood, a frightful pause. The railing had splintered. They were on the brink. Hugh bent and tried to take her in his arms.

He was strung to meet that awful plunge; he was face to face with death; but—was it by some miracle?—the car was stayed. There, on the very edge of destruction, with not an inch to spare, it stood suddenly motionless, as if checked by some mysterious, unseen force.

As complete understanding returned to him, Hugh saw that the woman at his feet had thrown herself upon the foot brake and was holding it pressed down with both her rigid hands.

* * *

"Yes; but who taught her where to look for the brake?" said Mountfort two hours later.

The excitement was over, but the subject fascinated Mountfort. The girl had sprung away and disappeared down one of the cliff paths directly Hugh had been extricated from danger. Mountfort was curious about her, but Hugh was uncommunicative. He had no answer ready to Mountfort's question. He scarcely seemed to hear it.

Barely a minute after its utterance he reached for his crutches and got upon his feet.

"I am going down to the shore," he said. "I shan't sleep otherwise. You'll excuse me, old fellow?"

Mountfort looked at him and nodded. He was very intimate with Hugh.

"Don't mind me!" he said.

And Hugh went out alone in the summer dusk.

The night was almost ghostly in its stillness. He went down the winding path that he knew so well without a halt. Far away the light of a steamer travelled over the quiet water. The sea murmured drowsily as the tide rose. It was not quite dark.

Outside her cottage-door he stopped and tapped upon the stone. The door stood open, and as he waited he heard a clear, low whistle behind him on the dunes. She was coming towards him, the great dog Caesar bounding by her side. As she drew near he noticed again how slight she was, and marvelled at her strength.

She reached him in silence. The light was very dim. He put out his hand to her, but somehow he could not utter a word.

"I knew it must be you," she said. "I—I was waiting for you."

She put her hand into his; but still the man stood mute. No words would come to him.

She looked at him uncertainly, almost nervously. Then—

"What is it?" she asked, under her breath.

He spoke at last but not to utter the words she expected.

"I haven't come to say, 'Thank you,' Molly," he said. "I have come to ask why."

"Oh!" said Molly.

She was startled, confused, almost scared, by the mastery that underlay the gentleness of his tone. He kept her hand in his, standing there, facing her in the dimness; and, cripple as he was, she knew him for a strong man.

"I have come to ask," he said—"and I mean to know—why yesterday you refused to marry me."

She made a quick movement. His words astounded her. She felt inclined to run away. But he kept her prisoner.

"Don't be afraid of me, Molly!" he said half sadly. "You had a reason. What was it."

She bit her lip. Her eyes were full of sudden tears.

"Tell me!" he said.

And she answered, as if he compelled her:

"It was because—because you don't love me," she said with difficulty.

She felt his hand tighten upon hers.

"Ah!" he said. "And that was—the only reason?"

Molly was trembling.

"It was the only reason that mattered," she said in a choked voice.

He leant towards her in the dusk.

"Molly," he said. "Molly, I worship you!"

She heard the deep quiver in his voice, and it thrilled her from head to foot. She began to sob, and he drew her towards him.

"Wait!" she said, "Oh, wait! Come inside, and I'll tell you!"

He went in with her, leaning on her shoulder.

"Sit down!" whispered Molly. "I'm going to tell you something."

"Don't cry!" he said gently. "It may be something I know already."

"Oh, no, it isn't!" she said with conviction.

She stood before him in the twilight, her hands clasped tightly together.

"Do you remember a girl called Mary Fielding?" she said, with a piteous effort to control her voice. "She used to be the friend of—of—your fiancee, Lady Maud Belville, long ago, before you had your accident."

He nodded gravely.

"I remember her," he said.

"I don't suppose you ever noticed her much," the girl continued shakily. "She was uninteresting, and always in the background."

"I should know her anywhere," said Durant with confidence.

"No, no," she protested. "I'm sure you wouldn't. You—you never gave her a second thought, though she—was foolish enough—idiotic enough—to—to care whether you did or not."

"Was she?" he said softly. "Was she? And was that why she came to live among the sand-dunes and cut off her hair and wore print dresses—and—and made life taste sweet to me again?"

"Ah! You know now!" she said, with a sound that was like laughter through tears.

He held out his arms to her.

"My darling," he said. "I knew on the first day I saw you here."

She knelt down beside him with a quick, impulsive movement.

"You—knew!" she gasped incredulously.

He smiled at her with great tenderness.

"I knew," he said, "and I wondered—how I wondered—what you had come for!"

"I only came to be a friend," she broke in hastily, "to—to try to help you through your bad time."

"I guessed it must be that," he said softly over her bowed head, "when you said 'No' to me yesterday."

"But you didn't tell me you cared," protested Molly.

"No," he said. "I was so horribly afraid that you might take me out of pity, Molly."

"And I—I wasn't going to be second fiddle!" said Molly waywardly.

She resisted him a little as he turned her face upwards, but he had his way. There was a quiver of laughter in his voice when he spoke again.

"You could never be that," he said. "You were made to lead the orchestra. Still, tell me why you did it, darling! Make me understand!"

And Molly yielded at length with her arms about his neck.

"I loved you!" she said passionately. "I loved you!"



* * * * *

THE WOMAN OF HIS DREAM

PROLOGUE

It was growing very dark. The decks gleamed wet in the light of the swinging lamps. The wind howled across the sea like a monster in torment. It would be a fearful night.

The man who stood clutching at the slanting deck rail was drenched from head to foot, but, despite this fact, he had no thought of going below. Reginald Carey had been for many voyages on many seas, but the fascination of a storm in the bay attracted him irresistibly still. He had no sympathy with the uneasy crowd in the saloons. He even exulted in the wild tumult of wind and sea and blinding rain. He was as one spellbound in the grip of the tempest.

Curt and dry of speech, abrupt at times almost to rudeness, he was a man of whom most people stood in awe, and with whom very few were on terms of intimacy. Yet in the world of men he had made his mark.

By camp-fires and on the march, in prison and in hospital, Carey the journalist had become a byword for coolness and endurance. It was Carey, caustic of humour, uncompromising of attitude, who sauntered through a hail of bullets to fill a wounded man's water-tin; Carey who pushed his way among stampeding mules to rescue sorely needed medical stores; Carey who had limped beside footsore, jaded men, and whistled them out of their depression.

There were two fingers missing from Carey's left hand, and the limp had become permanent when he sailed home from South Africa at the end of the war, but he was the personal friend of half the army though there was not a single man who could boast that he knew him thoroughly well. For none knew exactly what this man, who scoffed so freely at disaster, carried in his heart.

As he leaned on the rail of the tossing vessel, gazing steadfastly into the howling darkness, his face was as serene as if he sailed a summer sea. The great waves that dashed their foam over him as he stood were powerless to raise fear in his soul! He stood as one apart—a lonely watcher whom no danger could appal.

It was growing late, but he took no count of time. More than once he had been hoarsely advised to go below, but he would not go. He believed himself to be the only passenger on deck, and he clung to his solitude. The bare thought of the stuffy saloon was abhorrent to him. He marvelled that no one else had developed the same distaste.

And with the thought he turned, breathless from the buffeting spray of a mighty wave, to find a woman standing near him on the swirling deck.

She stood poised lightly as a bird prepared for flight, her head bare, her face upturned to the storm. Her hands were fast gripped upon the rail, and the gleam of a gold ring caught Carey's eye. He saw that she was unconscious of his presence. The shifting, uncertain light had not revealed him. For a space he stood watching her, unperceived, wondering at the courage that upheld her. Her hair had blown loose in the wind, and lay in a black mass upon her neck. He could not see her features, but her bearing was superb.

And then at length, as if his quiet scrutiny had somehow touched in her a responsive chord, she turned her head and saw him. Their eyes met, and a curious thrill ran tingling through the man's veins. He had never seen this woman before, but as she looked at him, with wonderful dark eyes that seemed to hold a passionate exultation in their depths, he suddenly felt as if he had known her all his life. They were comrades. It was no hysterical panic that had driven her up from below. Like himself, she had been drawn by the magic of the storm.

Impulsively, almost involuntarily, he moved a pace towards her and stretched out a hand along the dripping rail.

She gave him her own instantly and confidently, responding to his action with absolute simplicity. It was a gesture of sympathy, of fellowship. She bore herself as a queen, but she did not condescend to him.

No words passed between them. Both realised the impossibility of speech in that shrieking tempest. Moreover, there was no need for speech. Earth's petty conventions had fallen away from them. They were as children standing hand in hand on the edge of the unknown, hearing the same thunderous music, bound by the same magic spell.

Carey wondered later how long a time elapsed whilst they stood thus, intently watching. It might have been for merely a few minutes, or it might have been for the greater part of an hour. He never knew.

The spell broke at length suddenly and terribly, with a grinding crash that flung them both sideways upon the slippery deck. He went down, still clinging instinctively to the rail, and the next instant, by its aid, he was on his feet again, dragging his companion up with him.

There followed a pause—a shuddering, expectant pause—while wind and sea raged all around them like beasts of prey. And through it there came the sound of the engine throbbing impotently spasmodically, like the heart of a dying man. Quite suddenly it ceased, and there was a frightful uproar of escaping steam. The deck on which they stood began to tilt slowly upwards.

Carey knew what had happened. They had struck a rock in that awful darkness, and they were going down with frightful rapidity into the seething, storm-tossed water.

He had never been shipwrecked before, but, as by instinct, he realised the madness of remaining where he was. A coil of rope lay almost at his feet, and he stooped and seized it. There had come a brief lull in the storm, but he knew that there was not a moment to spare. Still supporting his companion, he began to bind the rope around them both.

She looked up at him quickly, and he saw her lips move in protest. She even set her hands against his breast, as if to resist him. But he overcame her almost savagely. It was no moment for argument.

The slope of the deck was becoming every instant more acute. The wind was racing back across the sea. Above them—very far above them, it seemed—there was a confusion of figures, but the tumult of wind and waves drowned all other sound. Carey's feet began to slip on that awful slant. They were sinking rapidly, rapidly.

He knotted the rope and gathered himself together. An instant he hung on the rail, breathing deeply. Then with a jerk he relaxed his grip and leaped blindly into the howling darkness, hurling himself and the woman with him far into the raging sea.

* * *

It was suffocatingly hot. Carey raised his arms with a desperate movement. He felt as if he were swimming in hot vapour. And he had been swimming for a long time, too. He was deadly tired. A light flashed in his eyes, and very far above him—like an object viewed through the small end of a telescope—he saw a face. Vaguely he heard a voice speaking, but what it said was beyond his comprehension. It seemed to utter unintelligible things. For a while he laboured to understand, then the effort became too much for him. The light faded from his brain.

Later—much later, it seemed—he awoke to full consciousness, to find himself in a Breton fisherman's cottage, watched over by a kindly little French doctor who tended him as though he had been his brother.

"Monsieur is better, but much better," he was cheerily assured. "And for madame his wife he need have no inquietude. She is safe and well, and only concerns herself for monsieur."

This was reassuring, and Carey accepted it without comment or inquiry. He knew that there was a misunderstanding somewhere, but he was still too exhausted to trouble himself about so slight a matter. He thanked his kindly informant, and again he slept.