of hers that she could not quite fathom, but
since she 'liked the looks of her' she did not regard this fact as
a serious drawback.

"Well, there's some folks as thinks one way and some another," she
conceded. "My husband always says as there's quite a lot of good in Robin
if he's treated decent. He's often round here at the forge. That's how he
come to get so fond of my Freddy. You ain't seen Freddy yet, miss. He's a
bit shy like with strangers, but he soon gets over it."

"You must bring him in to see me," said Juliet.

Mrs. Rickett beamed. "I will, miss, I will. I'll bring him in with the
pudding. P'raps if you was to give him a little bit he wouldn't be shy.
He's very fond of gingerbread pudding."

"I wish I were!" sighed Juliet, as her landlady's portly form
disappeared. "I shall certainly have to have a cigarette after it, and
then there will only be one left! Oh, dear, why was I brought up among
the flesh-pots?" She broke off with a sudden irresistible laugh, and
rising went to the window. Someone was sauntering down the road on the
other side of the high privet hedge. There came to her a whiff of
cigarette-smoke wafted on the sea-breeze. She leaned forth, and at the
gap by the gate caught a glimpse of a trim young man in blue serge
wearing a white linen hat. She scarcely saw his face as he passed, but
she had a fleeting vision of the cigarette.

"I wonder where you get them from," she murmured wistfully. "I believe I
could get to like that brand, and they can't be as expensive as mine."

The door opened behind her, and she turned back smiling to greet the
ginger pudding and Freddy.

CHAPTER III

MAGIC

The scent of the gorse in the evening dew was as incense offered to the
stars. To Juliet, wandering forth in the twilight after supper with
Columbus, the exquisite fragrance was almost intoxicating. It seemed to
drug the senses. She went along the path at the top of the cliff as one
in a dream.

The sea was like a dream-sea also, silver under the stars, barely
rippling against the shingle, immensely and mysteriously calm. She went
on and on, scarcely feeling the ground beneath her feet, moving through
an atmosphere of pure magic, all her pulses thrilling to the wonder of
the night.

Suddenly, from somewhere not far distant among the gorse bushes, there
came a sound. She stopped, and it seemed to her that all the world
stopped with her to hear the first soft trill of a nightingale through
the