ses clinging to life
between the granite ledges, the sea-gulls sailing over the cliffs, the
inward rush of the white-crested waves tossing the rockweed and kelpie
upward, and the starfish and anemones left by the tide had been her
playmates. She had learned to depend on these and her violin for
company. Lovers she had none, neither were other island young folk akin
to her. Between her mother and herself, also, was a chasm. It had been
opened when that unsympathetic mother forbade the violin in her house,
and was never afterward bridged. Jess only understood her. Jess, with
his quaint philosophy, tender heart, unselfish impulses, and love of
nature, had been her spiritual and moral mentor. To him had she gone
with her moods, and upon him lavished her childhood and girlhood love.

And then had come a new and strangely sweet illusion, a glow of new
sunshine warming her heart and adding a roseate hue to her thoughts. It
was unaccountable but charming, and seemed to lend a sparkle to the sea
waves, a more impressive grandeur to the limitless ocean, a tenderer
beauty to the moonlight. The gorge and the cave seemed an enchanted nook
in fairyland, and the old tide mill a romantic ruin.

Then had come the climax of this strange intoxication, the one ecstatic
moment when this magician over her thoughts, this Prince Perfect, had
entwined his arms about her and whispered, "I love you."

Repel him she could not, neither did she care to do so. It was to her as
if the gates of another world were opened; and in the wondrous thrill of
his lips she forgot herself, life, and God, even.

And then the cold and cruel message that said to her, "Forget me as I
must you." It was a summer-day dream, with no hope of renewal.

Then came the long fight against her own heart's desire, the months of
hopeless hope, and, at last, the will to win her way to the world's
applause.

He was there! He might, must, see or hear of her! He had said the world
would listen entranced if she had but the courage to stand before them!
And the old Carver will that was in her now nerved her to her trial.

And in the days and weeks of the strange new life while she hoped, and
yet feared, to meet him, that one thought was her staff. It was with her
by day and by night, a silent defiance of love, a revenge for her pain.
When the supreme moment of her trial came and she stood before that sea
of faces, only her young, trembling body was there, her every thought,
her