own precious thing."

He held her close to him and they both trembled--she with her first fear
of those undefinable forces and associations which go to make the
mystery of place, he with the passion of his faithfulness, of his vows
of devotion, too fierce and sacrificial even to express.

"Let's go and have tea," she said, suddenly disengaging herself, "I'll
get the creeps if we stop out here on the beach much longer--reckon I've
got 'em now, and I never was the one to be silly like that. I told you
it was a tedious hole."

They went to the Britannia, on the eastern side of the bill. The inn
looked surprised to see them, but agreed to put the kettle on. They sat
together in a little queer, dim room, smelling of tar and fish, and
bright with the flames of wreckwood. Joanna had soon lost her fears--she
talked animatedly, telling him of the progress of her spring wheat; of
the dead owl that had fallen out of the beams of Brenzett church during
morning prayers last Sunday, of the shocking way they had managed their
lambing at Beggar's Bush, of King Edward's Coronation that was coming
off in June.

"I know of something else that's coming off in June," said Martin.

"Our wedding?"

"Surelye."

"I'm going into Folkestone next week, to that shop where I bought my
party gown."

"And I'm going to Mr. Pratt to tell him to put up our banns, or we
shan't have time to be cried three times before the first of June."

"The first!--I told you the twenty-fourth."

"But I'm not going to wait till the twenty-fourth. You promised me
June."

"But I shan't have got in my hay, and the shearers are coming on the
fourteenth--you have to book weeks ahead, and that was the only date
Harmer had free."

"Joanna."

Her name was a summons, almost stern, and she looked up. She was still
sitting at the table, stirring the last of her tea. He sat under the
window on an old sea-chest, and had just lit his pipe.

"Come here, Joanna."

She came obediently, and sat beside him, and he put his arm round her.
The blue and ruddy flicker of the wreckwood lit up the dark day.

"I've been thinking a lot about this, and I know now--there is only one
thing between us, and that's Ansdore."

"How d'you mean? It ain't between us."

"It is--again and again you seem to be putting Ansdore in the place of
our love. What other woman on God's earth would put off her marriage to
fit in with the sheep-shearing?"

"I ain't putting it off. We haven't fix