t these had been
handed down through many generations. Those of later origin were
carefully wrought duplicates of the choicest models. In her astonishment
amid surroundings so strange and yet so pleasant, with the savor of
cooking food in her nostrils, Ethel for the moment almost forgot the
mystery and the peril through which she had passed--almost forgot, for a
fleeting instant, the lover she had summoned to her aid by a message
cast into the sea.

CHAPTER XIV

GARNET THE HERO

The dwellers of the Sound Country are early risers. For this reason,
Ethel Marion was up and dressed next morning earlier than ever before in
her life. The dawn was just breaking when breakfast was announced. One
of the buxom girls came to offer her services in dressing the invalid
stranger. Then she was assisted to the porch for a breath of the early
morning air, and she exclaimed in delight over the splendid view there
unfolded. Far off to the eastward the sun was just climbing up from
behind a sand dune on the Banks. For miles up and down the coast the
broken sand hills ran in a line north and south, trending the horizon.
These showed free from any vegetation except the scrub growth at their
base and the sand of them shone under the rays of the rising sun like
molten silver. In the foreground were the blue waters of the Sound now
dimpling under the caressing touches of a gentle breeze. Here and there
showed high lights from the whitecaps that stood out as souvenirs still
of the storm that had passed. Off to the right of the small bay upon
which the house was built, a tangled mass of evergreen shrubs offered a
vivid note in the color scheme. These were the undergrowth of the huge
forest trees, of which the limbs were almost hidden by the clinging
wreaths of mistletoe.

The esthetic sense of Ethel was touched to the deeps by this vista of
beauty round-about. No wonder that the dwellers in this blessed region
lived contented in youth, maturity, and old age. She wondered, rather,
that anyone could be cross or ill tempered or evil in any way within the
environment of a nature so benign.

She was reluctant when Miss Goodwin gently led her away from the
panorama of beauty toward the more sordid pleasure of the breakfast
table. As she went, Ethel offered a silent and most devout prayer of
gratitude for her preservation and for the kindness she had received
from Doctor Garnet and these strangers, whom just now she was very near
to lovin