now the rig of every vessel that
sailed the sea. Further than that, she herself was unaware that every
morning as she opened the newspaper she inadvertently turned first of
all to the 'Naval and Military Intelligence,' until

she had acquired an extraordinary knowledge of the goings and comings
and foreign stations of Her Majesty's ships. And if she sometimes
reflected that most officers were transferred to home stations for a
time, or took their leave in the ordinary way, and also that she had
never heard of Captain King--for she saw he had been made Commander on
account of some special service--being in England, was it not natural
that she might have a secret consciousness that she was perhaps
responsible for his long banishment?

But these solitary prowls along the coast, and these conferences with
Singing Sal, were wrong; and she knew they were wrong; and she went
back to the calmer atmosphere of those beautiful services in which the
commonplace, vulgar world outside was forgotten. She grew, indeed, to
have a mysterious feeling that to her the Rev. Charles Jacomb
personified religion, and that Singing Sal, in like manner, was a sort
of high priestess of Nature; and that they were in deadly antagonism.
They were Ormuzd and Ahriman. She was a strangely fanciful young
woman, and she dwelt much on this thing, until, half fearing certain
untoward doubts and promptings of her heart, she began to think that if
now and at once Mr. Jacomb would only ask her to be his wife, she would
avoid all perils and confusions by directly accepting him, and so
decide her future for ever.

But that morning that brought her Madge's letter saying that Captain
Frank King was in Brighton, Nan was singularly disturbed. She was
staying with the Rev. Mr. Clark and his wife--an old couple who liked
to have their house brightened occasionally by the presence of some one
of younger years. They were good people--very, very good; and a little
tedious. Nan, however, was allowed considerable liberty, and was
sometimes away the whole day from breakfast-time till dinner.

Madge had written her letter in a hurry; but did not post it, in her
inconsequential fashion, until the afternoon of the next day, so that
Nan got it on the morning of the following day. She read and re-read
it; and then, somehow, she wanted to think about it in the open--under
the wide skies, near the wide sea. She wanted to go out--and think.
And she was a little bit terr