rom
this topic they glided naturally to Christmas and its coming
festivities, and Joan talked a good deal of the new silver watch they
had decided to give John as a Christmas gift, and so for some time she
was as full of plans and happy hopes as a little child could be.

She did not notice that after a while Denas grew weary and constrained,
that speech seemed a trouble to her, that she lost herself frequently
in reverie, and was as nearly nervous as she had accused her mother of
being. But the conversation finally flagged so much that Joan began
to worry about the weather once more. The wind was now frightful, the
icy rain rattled against the windows, and at the open door Joan could
hear billow on billow, crash on crash, shrieking blast on shrieking
blast. She was unable to preserve her cheerfulness. Like all strong
hearts in anxiety, she became silent. The platitudes of Denas,
dropped without interest, annoyed her; she only moved her head in
reply.

Midnight came, and no boats. There was a pitifully frequent opening of
cottage doors, and the sudden flashes of fire and candle light that
followed revealed always some white, fearful face thrust out into the
black night, in the hope of hearing the shouts of the home-coming men.
Joan could not keep away from the door; and the yawning of Denas, her
shifting movements, her uncontrolled sleepiness, irritated Joan. In
great anxiety, companionship not perfectly sympathetic is irritating;
mere mortals quiver under its infliction. For Denas could not perceive
any special reason for unusual fear; she longed to go to bed and sleep,
as she had done many a time before under the same circumstances. She
laid the Bible on the table before Joan and said: "Won't you read a
psalm and lie down a bit, mother?"

"No. Read for yourself, and to bed then if you want to go."

Denas opened the book. Her father's mark was in the psalms, and she
began to read to herself.

Joan's face was beneath her blue apron. David's words did not
interpret her at this hour; only her own lips could speak for her own
sorrow and fear. There was a deep stillness in the house. Outside the
tempest raged wildly. It seemed to Joan as if hours passed in that
interval of heart-trembling; she was almost shocked when the old clock
gave its long whirring warning and then struck only _one_. Her first
look was to the fire. It wanted replenishing. Her next was at Denas.
The girl was fast asleep. Her hands were across the o