ges of the diary were taken up with the description of the
twenty-four hours which she had spent on the open sea with himself, of
their landing, dazed and exhausted, at the Dead Church, and her strange
desire to explore it, their arrival at the Abbey, and her meeting with
her father. After these came a passage that may be quoted:--

"He is not handsome--I call him plain--with his projecting brow, large
mouth, and untidy brown hair. But notwithstanding his stoop and his
thin hands, he looks a fine man, and, when they light up, his eyes are
beautiful. It was brave of him, too, very brave, although he thinks
nothing of it, to come out alone to look for me like that. I wonder what
brought him? I wonder if anything told his mind that I, a girl whom he
had never seen, was really on the ship and in danger? Perhaps--at any
rate, he came, and the odd thing is that from the moment I saw him, and
especially from the moment I heard his voice, I felt as though I had
known him all my life. Probably he would think me mad if I were to
say so; indeed, I am by no means sure that he does not pay me that
compliment already, with some excuse, perhaps, in view of the 'Song of
the Overlord' and all my wild talk. Well, after such a night as I had
spent anyone might be excused for talking foolishly. It is the reaction
from never expecting to talk again at all. The chief advantage of a
diary is that one may indulge in the luxury of telling the actual truth.
So I will say that I feel as though I had known him always; always--and
as though I understood him as one understands a person one has watched
for years. What is more, I think that he understands me more than most
people do; not that this is wonderful, seeing how few I know. At any
rate, he guesses more or less what I am thinking about, and can see
that there is something in the ideas which others consider foolish, as
perhaps they are.

"It is very odd that I, who had made sure that I was gone, should
be still alive in this pleasant house, and saved from death by this
pleasant companion, to find my father, whom I feared was dead, also
living. And all this after I had sung the 'Song of the Overlord!' So
much for its ill-luck. But, all the same, my father was rather
upset when he heard that I had been found singing it. He is very
superstitious, my dear old father; that is one of the few Norse
characteristics which he has left in him. I told him that there was no
use in being disturbed, since,