age; desirable; furnished; free of charge, with exception of
caretaker's wage."

A couple of letters from me, a couple in reply from the owner, who was
going for the winter months abroad, and the affair was settled.

Then my people who--although for ten years I have earned my own living,
and helped to keep some of them who have not earned theirs, although I
am five-and-thirty years of age and an absolutely dependable
person--have never let me have my own way in any single matter,
insisted that Julia should come with me. She is my youngest sister. I
have not a word to say against her, of course; only I know that the
things I am content to put up with are never good enough for Julia.

"Well, _what_ a place!" Julia repeated; the shifting of the accent did
not denote, I was sure, a more favourable view.

It certainly was not a pretty cottage. It was also quite out of the
town, in which we had believed it to be situated, standing at the
extremity of an unfinished road which led halfway across the sandy
waste lying between the town of Starbay and the village of Starcliff.

"A garden, back and front," Miss Ferriman had promised me in one of her
letters. There were the gardens, sure enough, but almost as unfinished
as the road. "An airy situation and uninterrupted view of the sea," the
description had continued, and was faithful as far as it went. The
wind, which happened to be blowing a gale, without obstruction of any
kind to break its force, buffeted us remorselessly as, having descended
from the car which had brought us from the station, we struggled up the
path to the door. Half a mile of blowing sand, with sparse, wiry grass
sticking through, was between us and the breakers; yet the ocean, cold
and lead-coloured, was beyond, and not so much as a finger-breadth of
impediment to check the prospect.

"Well, what a _place_!" said Julia again. "Let's go back, Isabella.
Don't let us go in."

But, once inside, we found the sitting-room which was to be ours
comfortable and prettily furnished; our two bedrooms--there were but
three--were also all that was necessary. Mine faced the sea beyond the
melancholy, level Denes, Julia, to my great content, choosing the one
looking out upon the back. The little back garden with its stunted
shrubs, the unmade road beyond, made a melancholy outlook, but one that
suited Julia better than the sea-view.

"The sight of the sea at this time of year gives me the most awful
feeling," sh