not be inclined to agree with you. You will be alive when you go into
the sea. If you cannot swim, the fault is not ours."

"And when, may I ask," Engleton continued, "do you propose to put into
operation your amiable plan?"

"Just whensoever we please, you d--d obstinate young puppy!" Forrest
cried, suddenly losing his nerve. "Curse your silent tongue and your
venomous face! You think you can get the better of us, do you? Well,
you are mistaken. You'll tell no stories from amongst the seaweed."

Engleton nodded.

"I shall take particular good care," he said, "to avoid the seaweed."

"Enough," Forrest declared. "Listen! Here is the issue. We are tired of
negative things. To-night you sign the paper and give us your word of
honour to keep silent, or before morning, when the tide is full, you go
into the sea!"

"I warn you," Engleton said, "that I can swim."

"I will guarantee," Forrest answered suavely, "that by the time you
reach the water you will have forgotten how."

CHAPTER XII

The days that followed were strange ones for Jeanne. Every morning at
sunrise, or before, she would steal out of the little cottage where she
was staying, and make her way along the top of one of the high dyke
banks to the sea. Often she saw the sun rise from some lonely spot
amongst the sandbanks or the marshes, heard the awakening of the birds,
and saw the first glimpses of morning life steal into evidence upon the
grey chill wilderness. At such times she saw few people. The house
where she was staying was apart from the village, and near the head of
one of the creeks, and there were times when she would leave it and
return without having seen a single human being. She knew, from
cautious inquiries made from her landlady's daughter, that Cecil and
Major Forrest were still at the Red Hall, and for that reason during
the daytime she seldom left the cottage, sitting out in the
old-fashioned garden, or walking a little way in the fields at the
back. For the future she made no plans. She was quite content to feel
that for the present she had escaped from an intolerable situation.

The woman from whom Jeanne had taken the rooms, a Mrs. Caynsard, she
had seen only once or twice. She was waited upon most of the time by an
exceedingly diminutive maid servant, very shy at first, but very
talkative afterwards, in broad Norfolk dialect, when she had grown a
little accustomed to this very unusual lodger. Now and then Kate
Caynsard,