him in his first
grief were gone now--he was the wronger--searching for the wife he had
driven forth to perish. And she was dead!

No clue--no hope!

He did not touch the shawl, but leaving Tom Fuller, went back and sat
down in Elsie's room, with the sick girl's delirious cries smiting his
ear, and terrible images rising before his eyes of Elizabeth--dying,
dead--drowned and dashed upon some lonely beach, with her cold, open
eyes staring blankly in his face.

Tom dropped the shawl in a wet mass at his feet, and walked away without
attempting to detain or comfort the stricken husband. He too believed
Elizabeth dead, and had no heart to offer consolation. Indeed, the pang
of sorrow that this conviction brought took away his own strength.

He walked on, over the wet sands of the beach, ready to cry out with the
anguish of this sudden bereavement, when the figure of old Caleb Benson
cast its long shadow on the shore.

"Is that you, Mr. Fuller, and alone? I'm mighty pleased to find any one
from the Cove--most of all you."

"Do you want me for anything particular?" asked Tom in a husky voice;
"if not I--I'm engaged just now."

"Well, yes; I must tell you," said the old man. "I've bin to your house
twice--once in the night--I thought mebby I'd see the young gal."

"What is it?" asked Tom, in the impotence of his grief.

"She made me promise not to tell--but whatever's wrong, you're her
cousin, and can't be hard on her--she's dreadful sick."

Tom caught his arm.

"My cousin--are you talking of my cousin, Mrs. Mellen?"

"Why yes, sure enough, though she never will forgive me for telling
you."

"But where is she? Where is she?" shouted Tom. "How did you find her?
Who got her out of the water? Great heavens, old man, can't you speak?"

"Well, this is the way it was," answered the old man. "T'other night, or
morning, for it was nigh on to daylight, I was eating breakfast with the
young uns, when one on 'em got scared by a face at the winder looking in
on us as we eat. I jist got one sight of the face, and kinder seemed to
know it. So up I jumps, and on with my great coat, and out into the fog.
Something gray went on afore me, and I follered, for sometimes it looked
like a woman, and sometimes not. Down it went, making a bee-line for the
beach, and I arter it full split, for it travelled fast, I can tell you.
The night had been kinder rough, and the waves dashed up high,
considering that the storm wasn't nothing muc