't be as anxious as they might otherwise have
been. They will probably guess pretty well what has happened."

He spoke with an assumption of confidence, but Peggy was not to be
deceived, and she turned on her heel and walked along the shore,
wringing her hands together, and catching her breath in short, gasping
sobs.

"Help me! Oh, help me!" she repeated over and over again in a quivering
voice, and the cry was addressed to no human ear. She was speaking
direct to One who understood her trouble, who knew without being told
the reason of her anxiety. Not in vain had Mrs Asplin set an example
of a Christian's faith and trust before the girl's quick-seeing eyes.
Peggy had never forgotten her sweet calm on hearing the doctor's
verdict, or that other interview in the vicarage garden when she herself
had first resolved to join the great army of Christ, and the habit was
growing daily stronger to turn to Him for help in all the difficult
paths of life. Now in "this moment of intensest anxiety her first
impulse was to leave her companions," and go away by herself where she
could pour out her heart in a deep, voiceless prayer. She walked round
to the further side of the little islet, and seating herself on the same
stone which an hour earlier had been the scene of her _tete-a-tete_ with
Hector, covered her face with her hands and rocked to and fro in an
abandonment of grief. They could not catch the train ... They could
send no telegram of reassurement; the night would pass--the long, long
night, and no word would be received of their safety ... For her own
father and mother she was not seriously concerned, for they were too old
travellers not to allow for unexpected delays, and had moreover
prophesied more than once that such a scatter-brained party would be
certain to miss their train; but Mrs Asplin with her exaggerated ideas
of distance, her terror of the sea, her nervous forebodings of evil--how
would she endure those long waiting hours? With her imaginative eye,
Peggy saw before her the scene in the drawing-room at the vicarage, as
the hour of arrival passed by without bringing the return of the
travellers; saw the sweet, worn face grow even paler and more strained,
the thin hands pressed against the heart. She recalled the pathetic
plea which had been made to her, and her own vow of remembrance, and
once more the responsibility of the position seemed heavier than she
could bear. "Oh, help me!" she murmured on