ed
courteously, and had expressed himself as charmed, he had not said
another word about it, so when the time came he started alone. On the
whole Helen, although she was by no means ill-pleased, was not a little
puzzled. In London, when it was sometimes difficult to obtain a place by
her side at all, Sir Allan had been the most assiduous and attentive of
cavaliers; but now that they were quite alone in the country, and her
company was even offered to him, he showed himself by no means eager to
avail himself of it. On the contrary, he had deliberately preferred
doing his botanizing alone. Well, she was quite satisfied, she thought,
with a little laugh. It was far better this way than the other. Still
she was puzzled.

Later in the afternoon she started for her favorite walk alone. She
nearly always chose the same way along the cliffs, through the fir
plantation, and sometimes as far as the hill by the side of which was
Falcon's Nest. It was a walk full of associations for her, associations
which had become so dear a part of her life that she always strove to
heighten them even by choosing the same hour of the day for her walk as
that well-remembered one when they had stood hand-in-hand for a single
moment in the shadows of the darkening plantation. And again, as it had
done many times before, her heart beat fast, and sweet memories began to
steal back to her as she passed under those black waving branches
moaning slightly in the evening breeze, and pressed under foot the brown
leaves which in a sodden mass carpeted the winding path. Yes, it was
here by that tall slender fir that they had stood for that one moment of
intense happiness, when the thunder of the sea filling the air around
them had almost forbidden speech, and the strange light had flashed in
his dark eyes. She passed the spot with slow, lingering steps and
quickening pulses, and opening the little hand-gate, climbed slowly up
the cliff.

At the summit she paused and looked around. A low grey mist hung over
the moor, and twilight had cast its mantle of half-veiled obscurity over
sea and land. A wind too had sprung up, blowing her ulster and skirts
around her, and driving the mist across the moor in clouds of small,
fine rain. Before her she could just see the dim outline of the opposite
hill, with its dark patch of firs, and Falcon's Nest, bare and distinct,
close up against its side. The wind and the rain blew against her, but
she took no heed. All persona