a child again, telling out her
thoughts with all a child's frankness. "I've been in a dream this past
year--a lovely dream--a fair dream, but only a dream, after all. And
now I've wakened. And you are part of the wakening--the best part! Oh,
to think I never knew before!"

"Knew what, my girl?"

He had her close against his heart now; the breath of her lips mingled
with his, but he would not kiss her yet.

"That I loved you," she whispered back. "Oh, Rob, you are all the
world to me. I belong to you and the sea. But I never knew it until I
crossed the harbour tonight. Then I knew--it came to me all at once,
like a flood of understanding. I knew I could never go away
again--that I must stay here forever where I could hear that call of
wind and waves. The new life was good--good--but it could not go deep
enough. And when you did not come I knew what was in my heart for you
as well."

* * * * *

That night Nora lay beside her sisters in the tiny room that looked
out on the harbour. The younger girls slept soundly, but Nora kept
awake to listen to the laughter of the wind outside, and con over what
she and Rob had said to each other. There was no blot on her happiness
save a sorry wonder what the Camerons would say when they knew.

"They will think me ungrateful and fickle," she sighed. "They don't
know that I can't help it even if I would. They will never
understand."

Nor did they. When Nora told them that she was going back to Racicot,
they laughed at her kindly at first, treating it as the passing whim
of a homesick girl. Later, when they came to understand that she meant
it, they were grieved and angry. There were scenes of pleading and
tears and reproaches. Nora cried bitterly in Mrs. Cameron's arms, but
stood rock-firm. She could never go back to them--never.

They appealed to Nathan Shelley finally, but he refused to say
anything.

"It can't be altered," he told them. "The sea has called her and
she'll listen to naught else. I'm sorry enough for the girl's own
sake. It would have been better for her if she could have cut loose
from it all and lived your life, I dare say. But you've made a fair
trial and it's of no use. I know what's in her heart--it was in mine
once--and I'll say no word of rebuke to her. She's free to go or stay
as she chooses--just as free as she was last year."

Mrs. Cameron made one more appeal to Nora. She told the girl bitterly
that she was ungrate