ughter as she went to help
her turn them out.

Half an hour later the island was silent as the grave, but for the
mournful voices of the wind as it sighed up from the sea. Like white
sentries stood the three tents of the men on one side of the ridge, and
on the other side, half hidden by some birches, whose leaves just
shivered as the breeze caught them, the women's tents, patches of
ghostly grey, gathered more closely together for mutual shelter and
protection. Something like fifty yards of broken ground, grey rock, moss
and lichen, lay between, and over all lay the curtain of the night and
the great whispering winds from the forests of Scandinavia.

And the very last thing, just before floating away on that mighty wave
that carries one so softly off into the deeps of forgetfulness, I again
heard the voice of John Silence as the train moved out of Victoria
Station; and by some subtle connection that met me on the very threshold
of consciousness there rose in my mind simultaneously the memory of the
girl's half-given confidence, and of her distress. As by some wizardry
of approaching dreams they seemed in that instant to be related; but
before I could analyse the why and the wherefore, both sank away out of
sight again, and I was off beyond recall.

"Unless you should send for me sooner."

II

Whether Mrs. Maloney's tent door opened south or east I think she never
discovered, for it is quite certain she always slept with the flap
tightly fastened; I only know that my own little "five by seven, all
silk" faced due east, because next morning the sun, pouring in as only
the wilderness sun knows how to pour, woke me early, and a moment later,
with a short run over soft moss and a flying dive from the granite
ledge, I was swimming in the most sparkling water imaginable.

It was barely four o'clock, and the sun came down a long vista of blue
islands that led out to the open sea and Finland. Nearer by rose the
wooded domes of our own property, still capped and wreathed with smoky
trails of fast-melting mist, and looking as fresh as though it was the
morning of Mrs. Maloney's Sixth Day and they had just issued, clean and
brilliant, from the hands of the great Architect.

In the open spaces the ground was drenched with dew, and from the sea a
cool salt wind stole in among the trees and set the branches trembling
in an atmosphere of shimmering silver. The tents shone white where the
sun caught them in patches. Below lay