ember
something of the sort."

"And a word spoken so is an oath and lasts for ever. Very well;
answer me what I came to ask you to-night."

"What is that?" But he knew.

"That when--you know--when I tell you I was deceived . . . you will
forgive." Her voice was scarcely audible.

"I forgive."

"Ah, but freely? It is only a word I want; but it has to last me
like an oath."

"I forgive you freely. It was all a mistake."

"And you have found other ambitions! And they satisfy you?"

He laughed and pulled at the rope again. "They ought to," he
answered gaily, "they're big enough. Come and see."

The seaward end of the cable was attached to a doorway thirty feet
above the base of the lighthouse. One of the under-keepers met them
here with a lantern. He stared when he caught sight of the second
figure in the cradle, but touched his cap to the mistress of
Carwithiel.

"Here's Mrs. Vyell, Trevarthen, come to do honour to our opening
night."

"Proudly welcome, ma'am," said Trevarthen. "You'll excuse the litter
we're in. This here's our cellar, but you'll find things more
ship-shape upstairs. Mind your head, ma'am, with the archway--better
let me lead the way perhaps."

The archway was indeed low, and they were forced to crouch and almost
crawl up the first short flight of steps. But after this Honoria,
following Trevarthen's lantern round and up the spiral way, found the
roof heightening above her, and soon emerged into a gloomy chamber
fitted with cupboards and water-tanks--the provision room. From this
a ladder led straight up through a man-hole in the ceiling to the
light-room store, set round with shining oil-tanks and stocked with
paint-pots, brushes, cans, signalling flags, coils of rope, bags of
cotton waste, tool-chests. . . . A second ladder brought them to the
kitchen, and a third to the sleeping-room; and here the light of the
lantern streamed down on their heads through the open man-hole above
them. They heard, too, the roar of the ventilator, and the
_ting-ting_, regular and sharp, of the small bell reporting that the
machinery revolved.

Above, in the blaze of the great lenses, old Pezzack and the second
under-keeper welcomed them. The pair had been watching and
discussing the light with true professional pride; and Taffy drew up
at the head of the ladder and stared at it, and nodded his slow
approbation. The glare forced Honoria back against the glass wall,
and she caught at it