hese years to forget the danger in which she stood, to imagine that
she had buried her tragedy too deep for discovery? Had she been mad to
marry Jim, her dear, sweet, protecting old Jim, who was always so good
to her?

But at the thought of him, and of her bitter need of him in this
desolate hour, Julia fell to violent crying, and after her tears she
drifted into a deep sleep, her lashes wet, and her breast occasionally
rising with a sharp sigh as a child's might.

When she awakened, dawn was breaking, the level waste of the sea was
pearl colour and rose under a slowly rising mist. Julia bathed and
dressed, and went out to the deck, where, with a great plaid wrapped
about her, she might watch the miracle of the birth of day. And as the
warming rays of the sun enveloped her, and the newly washed decks dried
under its touch, and as signs of life began to be heard all about,
slamming doors and gay greetings, laughter and the crisp echoes of feet,
hope and self-confidence crept again into her heart. She was young,
after all, and pretty, and Jim's very agony of jealousy only proved that
he loved her. She had never deceived him, he could not accuse her of one
second's weakness there. He had only had a sudden, terrible revelation
of the truth he had known so long; it could not affect him permanently.

"Going down?" said a voice gayly.

Julia turned to smile upon a group of cheerful acquaintances.

"Thinking about it," she smiled.

"Where's Himself?" somebody asked.

"Still asleep--the lazy bones!" Julia answered calmly. They all went
downstairs together, and Julia was perhaps a little ashamed to find the
odours of coffee and bacon delightful, and to enjoy her breakfast.

Afterward she went straight to her room, not at all surprised to find
Jim there, flung, dressed as he was, across his bed, and breathing
heavily. Julia studied him for a moment in silence. Then she set about
the somewhat difficult task of rousing him, quite her capable wifely
little self when there was something she could do for him.

"Jim! You'll have to get these damp things off, dear! Come, Jim, you
can't sleep this way. Wake up, Jim!"

Drowsily, heavily, he consented to be partially undressed, and covered
with a warm rug. Julia grew quite breathless over her exertions, tucked
him in carefully.

"I'm going to tell the chambermaid not to come in until I ring, Jim. But
shall I send you in a cup of coffee?"

"Ha!" Jim said, already asleep.

"Do