en modern woman, is the slave of
circumstances and the fool of fate.

"Audrey, Audrey, my dear!" called a wind-blown voice across the
sand-hills. Solitude had frightened Miss Craven out of the bungalow, and
she was picking her way in and out among the rabbit holes.

North Devon was hateful to cousin Bella. She hated the wastes of sand
and sea, the discomforts of the bungalow, the slow hours uncertainly
measured by meal-times that seemed as if they would never come. Her
brain was wild with unsatisfied curiosity. Yet she had tact in the
presence of real suffering. She had forborne to question Audrey about
the past, and their present life was not fruitful in topics. She did
nothing but wonder. "I wonder when it will be tea-time? I wonder if
there was anything between Audrey and her cousin? I wonder which of
those three gentlemen it was? I wonder when it will be tea-time?" That
was the monotonous rondo of her thoughts to which the sea kept time.

"Audrey, my dear, come in! I think it must be lunch-time," she wailed.
But no answer came from the hollow. She meekly turned, and picked her
way back again across the sand-hills.

Audrey lay hidden till the forlorn little figure was out of sight; then
she got up and looked around her. She shuddered. Her life was as bleak
as the bleak landscape smitten by the salt wind--cold and grey and
formless as the winter sea.

What was that black silhouette on the sands? She strained her eyes to
see. Another figure was making its way towards her from the bungalow.
When it came near she recognised the unofficial rustic who brought
telegrams from the nearest post-town. She waited. The man approached her
with an inane smile on his face.

"Teleegram vur yue, Mizz," he drawled.

She tore open the cover, and read: "Come at once. Vincent dying. Wire
what train you come by.--Katherine."

She crumpled the paper in her clenched hand. The landscape was blotted
out; she saw nothing but the envelope lying at her feet, a dull orange
patch against the greyish sand.

"Any awnzur, Mizz?"

"No." She shut her eyes and tried to realise it. "Yes--yes, there is!
Wait--I must look out my trains first."

She made out that by driving to Barnstaple, and catching the two-o'clock
train, she would reach Waterloo about eight. She sent the man back with
a telegram saying that she would be in Devon Street by nine that evening
at the latest.

It was past one then, and she had yet to pack. It was hopeless--she