be sure I shall never go near them any more."

"Unless you happen to see me," said Robert, his face flushed with his
happy thought, "and then you will give me the pleasure of coming after
you."

She looked at him, shifted her parasol, and laughed a little.

"Pleasure! really, Mr. Trevanion, were you not very much frightened?"

"Not for myself, except just for an instant."

"Oh, I was awfully frightened! I thought I must give up. I never, never
shall forget that moment when you laid hold of me."

"But you have been in the water again this morning."

"Oh, yes! I do enjoy it so, and of course I did not go far. That stupid
bathing-man, by the way, ought to have looked out yesterday. He might
have come in the boat and have saved you a wetting. I believe he was
asleep."

"He is old, and I am very, very glad he did not see you. Aren't you
tired? Would you not like to sit down a moment before we go back?"

They sat down on one of the rocks near the edge of the water.

"You are a very good swimmer, Mr. Trevanion."

"No, not very; and yesterday I was particularly bad, for a kind of
faintness came over me just before I reached you, and I thought I was
done for."

"Dear me! how dreadful! How did you conquer it?"

"Merely by saying to myself I would not give in, and I struggled with it
for a minute and then it disappeared."

"How strong you must be! I am sure I could not do that."

"Ah! there was something else, Miss Shipton. You see, I had you ahead of
me, and I thought I could be of some service to you."

Miss Shipton made no direct reply, but threw some pebbles in the water.
Robert felt himself gradually overcome, or nearly overcome, by what to
him was quite new. He could not keep his voice steady, and although what
he said was poor and of no importance, it was charged with expressionless
heat. For example, Miss Shipton's parasol dropped and she stooped to
pick it up. "Let me pick it up," he said, and his lips quivered, and the
let me pick it up--a poor, little, thin wire of words--was traversed by
an electric current raising them to white-hot glow, and as powerful as
that which flows through many mightier and more imposing conductors.
What are words? "Good-bye," for example, is said every morning by
thousands of creatures in the London suburbs as they run to catch their
train, and the present writer has heard it said by a mother to her
beloved boy as she stepped on board the tug which was about t