"How still it is, Owen," remarked my love, after sitting in silence
for a few minutes. From where we sat we could see that it was high
tide, and the waves were lazily lapping the base of the cliffs deep
below. Now and then a gull would circle about us with its shrill,
plaintive cry, while far on the distant horizon lay the trail of smoke
from a passing steamer. "How delightful it is to be here--alone with
you!"

My arm stole round her slim waist, and my lips met hers in a fond,
passionate caress. She looked very dainty in a plain walking costume
of cream serge, with a boa of ostrich feathers about her throat, and a
large straw hat trimmed with autumn flowers. It was exceptionally
warm for the time of year; yet at night, on the breezy East Coast,
there is a cold nip in the air even in the height of summer.

That afternoon we had, by favour of its owner, Mr. George Beeforth,
one of the pioneers of Scarborough, wandered through the beautiful
private gardens of the Belvedere, which, with their rose-walks, lawns
and plantations, stretched from the promenade down to the sea, and had
spent some charming hours in what its genial owner called "the
sun-trap." In all the north of England there are surely no more
beautiful gardens beside the sea than those, and happily their
good-natured owner is never averse to granting a stranger permission
to visit them.

As we now sat upon that stile our hearts were too full for words,
devoted as we were to each other.

"Owen," my wife exclaimed at last, her soft little hand upon my
shoulder as she looked up into my face, "are you certain you will
never regret marrying me?"

"Why, of course not, dearest," I said quickly, looking into her great
wide-open eyes.

"But--but, somehow----"

"Somehow, what?" I asked slowly.

"Well," she sighed, gazing away towards the far-off horizon, her
wonderful eyes bluer than the sea itself, "I have a strange,
indescribable feeling of impending evil--a presage of disaster."

"My darling," I exclaimed, "why trouble yourself over what are merely
melancholy fancies? We are happy in each other's love; therefore why
should we anticipate evil? If it comes, then we will unite to resist
it."

"Ah, yes, Owen," she replied quickly, "but this strange feeling came
over me yesterday when we were together at Whitby. I cannot describe
it--only it is a weird, uncanny feeling, a fixed idea that something
must happen to mar this perfect happiness of ours."

"Wha