where I was going. I have not had a letter since I left London.
I have been buried alive in this heavenly little place."

"There now, Mademoiselle," said Margaret, with a bow. "Are you
satisfied now?"

"I was satisfied before you opened your mouth, my dear. The
possibility inevitably suggested itself, but it was stillborn. Has not
our friendship passed its seventh birthday?"

"Thank you, dear. But the coincidence of our coming to bury ourselves
in Sark, and Mr. Graeme's coming to bury himself in Sark, was almost
unbelievable."

"Not at all," said Miss Penny. "If you could both trace back you would
probably find the same original spring of action--a chance word from
some common friend, or some article you have both read. Then, when
circumstances loosed the spring, you both shot in the same direction.
What was it loosed your spring, Mr. Graeme?"

"Well,--I wanted to get away out of things. I'm busy on a book, you
see, and I'd heard of Sark--"

"Same here!" said Miss Penny--"less the book. We wanted to get away
out of things--and people, and we'd heard of Sark, and here we are.
Was it you suggested Sark, or I, Meg?"

"I'm sure I don't know, dear. You, I should think."

"I will take all the credit of it."

Just then Mrs. Carre, who had been down to John Philip's for bread,
turned in out of the road with a loaf under each arm. At sight of all
her guests fraternising, her face lit up with a broad smile, and
Scamp, who had whirled in after her, twisted himself into
hieroglyphics of delight and rent the air with his expression of it,
and then launched himself at Punch and taxed him with perfidy in going
off to bathe without him.

"Ah, you have med friends with the leddies," she said to Graeme.
"Scamp! Bad beast, be qui-et! A couche!"

"I'm doing my best, Mrs. Carre."

"That iss very nice."

"Very nice, indeed!" And Miss Penny asserted afterwards that he was
looking at Margaret all the time.

"I told them you were a nice quiet gentleman and wouldn't disturb them
at all," said Mrs. Carre.

"I'll do my very best not to. So far the disturbance has been all on
their side, but I'm standing it very well, you see. You'll let me show
you the sights, won't you?" he said to Miss Brandt. "I've been here a
month, you see, and I know it all like a book. I've done nothing but
moon about since I came--"

"I thought you were busy on a book," said Miss Penny.

"Er--well, you see, you have to do a lot of thinking before yo