xtra ducking won't hurt me,
and I have had a chain put up to prevent anybody from being washed away.
And now I must be going. Good-night."

"Good-night, Mr. Davies."

He hesitated a moment and then added: "Would you--would you mind telling
your sister--of course I mean when she is stronger--that I came to
inquire after her?"

"I think that you can do that for yourself, Mr. Davies," Elizabeth said
almost roughly. "I mean it will be more appreciated," and she turned
upon her heel.

Owen Davies ventured no further remarks. He felt that Elizabeth's manner
was a little crushing, and he was afraid of her as well. "I suppose that
she does not think I am good enough to pay attention to her sister," he
thought to himself as he plunged into the night and rain. "Well, she is
quite right--I am not fit to black her boots. Oh, God, I thank Thee
that Thou hast saved her life. I thank Thee--I thank Thee!" he went on,
speaking aloud to the wild winds as he made his way along the cliff. "If
she had been dead, I think that I must have died too. Oh, God, I thank
Thee--I thank Thee!"

The idea that Owen Davies, Esq., J.P., D.L., of Bryngelly Castle,
absolute owner of that rising little watering-place, and of one of
the largest and most prosperous slate quarries in Wales, worth in all
somewhere between seven and ten thousand a year, was unfit to black
her beautiful sister's boots, was not an idea that had struck Elizabeth
Granger. Had it struck her, indeed, it would have moved her to laughter,
for Elizabeth had a practical mind.

What did strike her, as she turned and watched the rich squire's sturdy
form vanish through the doorway into the dark beyond, was a certain
sense of wonder. Supposing she had never seen that shiver of returning
life run up those white limbs, supposing that they had grown colder
and colder, till at length it was evident that death was so firmly
citadelled within the silent heart, that no human skill could beat his
empire back? What then? Owen Davies loved her sister; this she knew and
had known for years. But would he not have got over it in time? Would
he not in time have been overpowered by the sense of his own utter
loneliness and given his hand, if not his heart, to some other woman?
And could not she who held his hand learn to reach his heart? And to
whom would that hand have been given, the hand and all that went
with it? What woman would this shy Welsh hermit, without friends or
relations, have ever be