Chapter XXXIII: A Turbulent Sea

Boisterous weather. Ethel Reene, her scarlet cloak on, and her hat tied securely over her ears, was making her way to the top of the cliff opposite the coastguard station. A somewhat adventurous expedition in such a wind; but Ethel was well used to the path. She sat down when she reached the top: dropped down, laughing heartily. For the blast seized rudely on her petticoats, and sent the silken cords and tassels of her cloak flying in the air.

A glorious sea. A sea to look at to-day: to excite awe; to impress the mind with the marvellous works of the Great Creator. "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no farther. And here shall thy proud waves be stayed."

The waves were leaping mountains high; the foam and spray dashed aloft; the sound of the roar was like prolonged thunder. Ethel sat with clasped hands and sobered face and heart, lost in contemplation of the Majesty seen and unseen. It was not the time for silent thought to-day, or for telling her secrets to the sea: wonder, praise, awe, they could alone fill the mind.

"What a grand scene!"

The words were spoken close to her ear, and she turned her head quickly, holding her hat. The fastenings of her hair had blown away, and it fell around her in a wave of curls. Mr. North was the speaker. He had made his way up the rocks to watch this wondrous sea from that elevated place, not suspecting any one was there.

"I do not think I ever saw it so rough as this," said Ethel, as he took her hand in greeting, and then sat down beside her.

"I never saw it half as rough; never: but it has not been my privilege to live near the sea," he answered. "Are you sure it is safe for you to sit here, Ethel?"

"Oh yes. I am ever so far from the edge, you see."

"I do not know," he doubtingly answered; "the blast is strong. Mr. and Mrs. Castlemaine might warn you away, did they see you here."

As if to impart weight to his words, a furious gust came sweeping along and over them. Ethel caught involuntarily to the hard ground, and bent her head down. Mr. North hastily put his arm round her for protection.

"You see, Ethel!" he spoke when the rush had subsided. "It is dangerous for you. Had I not been here, you might have been blown away."

"No, no; but--perhaps--I should not have remained after that. I do not think it was ever so fiercely rough."

As he was there, however, and holding her securely, she made no movement to go. Ah, how could she! was it not all too delicious!--bliss unutterable!--and the wind was such an excuse. In after years, whether for her they might be long or short, Ethel would never lose the remembrance of this hour. The panorama of that turbulent sea would be one of her mind's standing pictures; the clasp of his arm never cease, when recalled, to cause her heart to thrill.

They sat on, close together, speaking but a stray word now and then, for it was nearly as difficult to hear anything said as it would have been for deaf Sister Mildred. By-and-by, as if the wind wanted a temporary rest, its worst fury seemed abated.

"I wonder if I could sketch the sea?" cried Mr. North. "Perhaps I could: if you will help me to hold the book, Ethel."

He had his small sketch-book in his pocket: indeed he rarely went out without it: and he drew it forth. Ethel held the leaves down on one side the opened page, and he on the other: with his other hand he rapidly took the lines of the horizon before him, and depicted the mountainous billows of the raging sea. Just a few bold strokes--and: he left the rest to be filled in at a calmer season.

"Thank you that is enough," he said to Ethel. But it took both their efforts to close the book again securely. The wind had all but torn its pages out; a lawful prey.

"There are people existing who hate never seen the sea," remarked Ethel. "I wonder if they can form even a faint conception of the scene it presents on such a day as this?"

"Thousands and thousands have never seen it," said Mr. North. "Perhaps millions, taking the world from Pole to Pole."

Ethel laughed at a thought that came to her. "Do you know, Mr. North, there is an old woman at Stilborough who has never seen it. She has never in her life been as far as Greylands--only three miles."

"It is scarcely believable."

"No: but it is true. It is old Mrs. Fordham. Her two daughters kept a cotton and tape shop in New Street. They sell fishing-tackle, too, and writing-paper, and many other things. If you choose to go and ask Mrs. Fordham, for yourself, she would tell you she has never had the curiosity to come as far as as this to see the sea."

"But why?"

"For no reason, she says, except that she has always been a great stay-at-home. She had a good many children for one thing, and they took up all the time of her best years."

"I should like to charter a gig and bring the old lady to see it to-day," exclaimed Mr. North. "I wonder whether she would be astonished?"

"She would run away frightened," said Ethel, laughing. "Will you please to tell me what the time is?"

He took out his watch. It was past twelve o'clock; and Ethel had to go. Mr. North drew her hand within his arm, seemingly as a matter of course, remarking that he must pilot her down the cliff. Ethel's face was covered with blushes. She was too timid to withdraw her hand: but she thought what would become of her should Mr. or Mrs. Castlemaine meet them. Or even Madame! So they went on arm-in-arm.

"Should I make anything of this sketch," said Mr. North, touching his pocket that contained the book; "anything of a watercolour I mean, it shall be yours, if you accept it. A memento of this morning."

"Thank you," murmured Ethel, her lovely face all blushes again.

"You will think of me perhaps when you look at it--once in a way. I may be far away: divided from you by sea and land."

"Are you going so soon?" she stammered.

"I fear I shall have to go eventually. The--the business that is keeping me here does not advance at all; neither does it seem likely to."

"Is business keeping you here?"

"Yes."

"I had no idea of that. Of what nature?"

"It is partly connected with property."

"The property that you told me might come to you by inheritance?"

"Yes. The coming seems very far off, though; farther than ever: and I--I am doing myself no good by staying."

"No good!" exclaimed Ethel, in surprise.

"In one sense I am not: individually, I am not. For, each day that I stay will only serve to render the pain of departing more intolerable."

Their eyes met. Ethel was at no loss to understand. Whether he meant her to or not he could scarcely have decided. But for exercising some self-control, he must have spoken out plainly. And yet, to what end? This fair girl might never become more to him than she was now, and their mutual love would be flung away to die on the shoals of adverse fate; as three parts of first love is in this world.

He released her when they were on level ground, and walked side by side with her as far as Chapel Lane, Ethel's way home to-day. There they stood to shake hands.

"I wonder if we shall ever again sit together watching a sea such as this has been!" he said, retaining her hand, and gazing down at her conscious face.

"We do not get a sea like this above once or twice a year."

"No. And when you get it next, nothing may be left of me here but the memory. Good-bye, Ethel."

She made her way homewards as swiftly as the wind would allow. Mr. North, somewhat sheltered under the lee of the Grey Nunnery, once he had passed the open chapel ruins, gave his mind up to thought. The little school-children, protected by the walls of the high building, were playing on the waste ground at "You can't catch me."

His position had begun to cause him very serious reflection: in fact, to worry him. Nothing could be more uncertain than it was, nothing more unsatisfactory. Should it turn out that Mr. Castlemaine had had any hand in injuring Anthony--in killing him, in short--why, then George North must give up all hope of Ethel. Ethel was to Mr. Castlemaine as a daughter, and that would be a sufficient bar to George North's making her his wife. Long and long ago would he have declared himself to the Master of Greylands but for Charlotte Guise; he would go to him that very day, but for her, and say, "I am your nephew, sir, George Castlemaine:" and ask him candidly what he had done with Anthony. But only the bare mention of this presupposed line of conduct would upset poor Madame Guise utterly: she had implored, entreated, commanded him to be silent. He might go away from Greylands, she said, and leave all the investigation to her; she did not want him to stay; but to spoil every chance of tracing out Anthony's fate--and, as she believed, that would spoil it--was not to be heard of. This chafed Mr. North's spirit somewhat: but he felt that he could not act in defiance of his brother's widow. The morning's interview on the cliff with Ethel had not tended to lessen the uneasiness and embarrassments of his position, but rather to bring them more clearly before him.

"It would be something gained if I could only ascertain how the estate was really left," he said to himself as he glanced mechanically at the shouting children; just as so many others, including his unfortunate brother, had said before him. "If it be, de facto, my Uncle James's, why he could have had no motive for wishing Anthony out of the way: if it was left to my father, why then it was absolutely Anthony's, and the Uncle James was but a usurper. In that case--but it is very hard to think so ill of him. I wonder whether--" Mr. North made a pause to revolve the question--"whether I could get anything out of Knivett?"

Deep in, thought, the Nunnery passed, he unguardedly approached the open part by the beach. Whirr!--whew! His hat went one way, the skirts of his coat another. The latter, not being detached, had to return to their places; but the hat was nowhere.

Harry Castlemaine, chancing to pass, ran and caught it, and brought it, laughing, to Mr. North. The young men liked each other and were cordial when they met; but they had not advanced to intimacy. Each had his reasons for avoiding it: Harry Castlemaine never chose to become to friendly with any stranger sojourning at Greylands; George North, under his present pseudo aspect, rather shunned the Castlemaines.

"It is well heads are not loose, as well as hats, or they'd be gone to-day," said Harry, giving up the hat. "Where's your ribbon?"

"It had come unfastened from my buttonhole. Thank you. What a grand sea it is!"

"Wonderful. A rare sea, even for Greylands. Good-day."

Like a great many more of us, Mr. North sometimes did things upon impulse. As he crossed to the Dolphin, holding Ins hat on his head, the two-horse van came lumbering down the hill by the Nunnery on its way to Stilborough. Impulse--it certainly was not reason--induced George North to get inside and go off with it. In due course of time it conveyed him to Stilborough.

"Can you tell me where Mr. Knivett, the advocate, lives?" he asked of the driver when he was paying his fare.

"Lawyer Knivett, is it, sir, that you want? He lives close to the market-house, in the centre of the town."

"Which is my way to it?"

"Go to the end of the street, sir: take the first turning on the left, New Street, and that will bring you into the street where the marketplace is. Anybody will tell you which is Lawyer Knivett's."

Just as in the days, some months gone by, poor Anthony had been directed to the lawyer's house, and readily found it, so did the younger brother find it now. The brass-plate on the door, "Mr. Knivett, attorney-at-law," stared him in the face as he halted there. During the dinner-hour, between half-past one and two, this outer door was always shut; an intimation that clients were not wanted to call just then: at other times it was generally, though not invariably, open: impatient clients would often give it a bang behind them in escaping. Mr. North rang the bell, and was admitted to the clerk's room, where a young man, with curled black hair and a nose like a parrot's, sat behind a desk near the window, writing.

"Can I see Mr. Knivett?" asked George.

The young man stretched his neck forward to take a look at the applicant. "It's not office-hours," said he in answer, his tone superlatively distant.

"When will it be office-hours?"

"After two o'clock."

"Can I see him then--if I wait?"

"Well, yes, I suppose you can. There's a chair"--extending the feather-end of his pen to point it out: which caused the diamond ring he wore on his finger to flash in the sunlight.

"A vain young dandy," thought George, as he sat down, regarding the ring, and the curled hair, and the unexceptionable white linen. The gentleman was, in fact, a distant relative of Squire Dobie's, holding himself to be far above all the fraternity of men of the law, and deeming it an extremely hard case that his friends should have put him into it.

The silence broken only by the scratching of the pen, was interrupted by the sudden stopping before the house of a horse and gig. An active little gentleman of middle-age leaped out, came in, and opened the door of the room.

"Where's Mr. Knivett, Dobie? At his dinner?"

"Yes."

Away went the little gentleman somewhere further on in the house. Almost immediately he was back again, and Mr. Knivett with him. The latter opened the door.

"I am going out, Mr. Dobie. Don't know how long I may be detained. Old Mr. Seaton's taken ill." And, with that, he followed the little gentleman out, mounted the gig with him, and was gone.

It had all passed so quickly that George North had not space to get in a word. He supposed his chance of seeing the lawyer for that day was at an end.

Scarcely had the gig driven off, and Mr. Dobie brought back his head from gazing after it over the window blind, when there entered a gentleman in deep mourning: a good-looking man with a somewhat sad countenance. Mr. Dobie got off his stool with alacrity, and came forward.

"How are you, Sir William?"

Sir William Blake-Gordon--for it was he--returned the greeting: the two young men met occasionally in society.

"Can I see Mr. Knivett?" asked Sir William.

"No, that you can't," returned the gentleman-clerk. "Charles Seaton of the Hill has just fetched him out in a desperate hurry. Knivett, going out to the gig, put in his head to tell me old Seaton was taken ill. Wants his will altered, I suppose."

Sir William considered. "Tell Mr. Knivett, then, that I will be here at about eleven o'clock to-morrow. I wish to see him particularly."

"All right," said Mr. Dobie.

Sir William was turning away, when his eyes fell on George North, who had then risen preparatory to departure. He held out his hand cordially, and George North met it. A week or two previously, just before Sir Richard's death, it chanced that they had met at a country inn, and were detained there part of a day by a prolonged storm of rain and thunder. Each had liked the other, and quick acquaintanceship had been formed.

"Are you still at Greylands, Mr. North?"

"Yes."

"Well, do not forget that I shall be very glad to see you. Come over at any time."

"Thank you," replied George.

The new baronet went out. Mr. Dobie, witnessing all this, began to fancy that the gentleman might be somebody worth being civil to.

"I am sorry Knivett should have started off in this sudden way," he observed, his tone changed to ease, "but I suppose there was no help for it. Is there anything I can do for you?"

"No," returned George, "I fear not. I merely wanted to ask Mr. Knivett a question about a family in the neighbourhood."

"I dare say I could answer it," said Mr. Dobie. "I know all the best families as well as Knivett does, or better: been brought up among them."

"Do you know the Castlemaines?"

"Well, I ought to. My relatives, the Dobies of Dobie Hall, and the Greylands' Rest people used to be as thick as inkleweavers. Harry Castlemaine is one of my friends."

George North paused. An idea struck him that perhaps this young man might be able to give him some information: and, to tell the truth, though he had come to ask Mr. Knivett to do it, he had very little hope that the lawyer would. At least there would be no harm in his putting the question.

"I am a stranger here," he said. "Until some weeks back I never was in this part of the world or knew a soul that inhabited it. But I have become acquainted with a few people; and, amidst them, with the Castlemaines. Did you know the old grandfather, Anthony?"

"Just as well as I know my own grandfather."

"Greylands' Rest was his, I fancy?"

"Of course it was."

"To whom did he leave it?"

"Ah, that's a question," said Mr. Dobie, taking his penknife out to trim the top of one of his filbert nails. "There was a nephew made his unexpected appearance on the estate last winter--a son of the elder brother----"

"I have heard," interrupted George North: "Anthony Castlemaine."

"Just so. Well, he thought Greylands' Rest was his; wanted to put in a claim to it; but Mr. Castlemaine wouldn't allow it at any price. The claimant disappeared in some queer manner--you have no doubt heard of it--and James Castlemaine retains undisturbed possession. Which is said to be nine points of the law, you know."

"Then, you do not know how it was left? whether it is legally his?"

Mr. Dobie shook his head. "I'd not like to bet upon it, either way. If forced to do so, I'd lay it against him."

"You think it was left to Anthony Castlemaine," said George North quickly. "That is, to Anthony's father; Basil, the eldest brother."

"What I think is, that if Mr. Castlemaine could show he had any right to it, he would show it, and put an end to the bother," spoke Mr. Dobie.

"But he should be made to do this."

The clerk lifted his eyes from his nails, his eyebrows raised in surprise. "Who is to make him?"

"I'm sure I don't know. Could not the law?"

"The law must get a leg to stand upon before it can act. It has no right to interfere with Mr. Castlemaine. That young Anthony--if he's not dead--might come back and enter a process against him for restitution, and all that: in that case James Castlemaine would have to show by what tenure he holds it. But it might be an awfully long and expensive affair; and perhaps end in nothing."

"End in nothing?"

"Why, you see, if old Anthony Castlemaine simply made a present, while he was yet living, of Greylands' Rest to James, the latter would have to swear to it, and the thing would be done with. Some people think it was so. Others, and I for one, don't fancy it was his at all, but that poor young Anthony's."

"The Castlemaines have always been held to be men of honour, I believe?"

"And we should never have doubted James to be one--but for his refusal to satisfy his nephew and the public. Nothing but that raised a doubt against him. It is blowing over now."

"You do not know, then, how Greylands' Rest was left, or to whom?"

"No. I don't believe anybody does know, save Mr. Castlemaine himself. Unless it's Knivett. He may."

"But I dare say Knivett would not tell--even if he were pumped."

Mr. Dobie burst into a laugh at the idea. "Knivett tell the affairs of any of his clients!" said he. "You might as well set on and pump this high-backed chair as pump him."

The clerks, two of them, came in from dinner, and no more was said. George North walked back to Greylands, having taken nothing by his journey: just as the unfortunate Anthony had walked back to it many months before. The wind was blowing worse than ever. Several people, chiefly women, had gathered on the beach to look at the sea; but the spray and the roar nearly blinded and deafened them. Amidst others stood Mrs. Castlemaine, Ethel, and Flora: talking to them was the landlady of the Dolphin, a huge shawl tied over her head. George North approached.

"It is surely worse than it was this morning!" said George, after speaking to the ladies.

"And what'll it be when the tide is full up again!" cried Mrs. Bent, whose tongue was ever of the readiest. "Twenty years I've lived in this place, and never saw it like this. Look at that wave!--My patience!"

Almost as the words left her lips, there arose a cry of alarm. The wave, rearing itself to a towering height, came dashing in on the beach nearer than was bargained for, and engulfed Miss Flora Castlemaine. That young damsel, in defiance of commands, had been amusing herself by running forward to meet the waves and running back again before the water could catch her. This time she had not been quite so successful. The force of the water threw her down; and even as they looked, in the first moment of alarm, they saw her drifting rapidly out to sea with the returning tide.

Mrs. Castlemaine shrieked wildly. Nearly everybody shrieked. Some ran here, some yonder; some laid hold of one another in the nervousness induced by terror: and the child was being washed further out all the while. But the cries suddenly ceased; breaths were held in suspense: for one was going out to the rescue.

It was George North. Flinging off his coat and hat, he dashed through the waves, keeping his footing as long as he could, battling with the incoming tide. But for the boisterous state of the sea, the rescue would have been mere child's play; as it was, it cost him some work to reach and save her. He bore her back, out of the cruel water. She was quite insensible.

Ethel burst into tears. In the moment's agitation, she was not sure but she clasped his arm, wet as he was, when striving to pour forth her thanks. "Oh, how brave you are! How shall we ever repay you!"

He snatched a moment to look back into her eyes, to give her a smile that perhaps said all too much, and went on with his dripping burden. "To my house!" cried Mrs. Bent, rushing forward to lead the way. "There's a furnace of hot water there, for we've got a wash on to-day. And, Mr. North, sir, you'll just get yourself between the blankets, if you please, and I'll bring you up a dose of hot brandy-and-water."

To see them all scampering over to the Dolphin, with the picked-up coat and hat, the wind taking their petticoats behind, the two wet figures in their midst, and Mrs. Castlemaine wringing her hands in despair, was a sight for Greylands. But, at least, George North had saved the child.

The next event that happened to excite the village was the disappearance of Jane Hallet from the Nunnery. She disappeared, so to speak. In fact she ran away from it.

Something like a fortnight had elapsed since her illness, or from that to three weeks, and she was able to walk about her room and do, at her own request, some sewing for the Sisters. Mr. Harry Castlemaine had not intruded on the Nunnery again. It was getting time to think of what was to be done with her: where she was to go, how she was to live. Jane had been so meek, so humble throughout this illness, so thankful for the care and kindness shown her, and for the non-reproach, that the Grey Ladies, in spite of their inward condemnation, could not help liking her in their hearts almost as much as they had liked her before, and they felt an anxious interest in her future. Sister Mildred especially, more reflective than the others by reason of her years, often wondered what that future was to be, what it could be. Miss Hallet--shut up in her home, her cheeks pink with shame whenever she had to go abroad: which she took care should be on Sundays only; but divine service, such as it was in Greylands, she would not miss--had never been to the Nunnery to see Jane, or taken the slightest notice of her. Sister Mildred had paid another visit to the cliff, and held a second conference with Miss Hallet, but it resulted in no good for Jane.

"She has blighted her own life and embittered mine," said Miss Hallet. "Never more can I hold up my head among my neighbours. I will not willingly see her again; I hope I never shall see her."

"The worst of it is, that all this reprobation will not undo the past," returned Sister Mildred. "If it would, if it could have served to prevent it, I'd say punish Jane to the last extreme of harshness. But it won't."

"She deserves to be punished always."

"The evil has come upon her, and everybody knows it. Your receiving her again in your home will not add to it or take from it. She has nowhere else to go."

"I pray you cease, Sister Mildred," said Miss Hallet; and it was plain to be seen that she spoke with utter pain. "You cannot--pardon me--you cannot understand my feelings in this."

"What shall you do without Jane? She was very useful to you; she was a companion."

"Could I ever make a companion of her again? For the rest, I have taken a little servant--Brown the blacksmith's eldest girl--and I find her handy."

"If I could but induce you to be lenient, for Jane's sake!" urged the pleading Sister, desperately at issue between her own respect for Miss Hallet's outraged feelings and her compassion for Jane.

"I never can be," was the answer, spoken stiffly: but Miss Hallet's fingers were trembling as she smoothed back her black silk mitten. "As to receiving her under my roof again, why, if I were ever brought to do that, I should be regarded as no better than herself. I should be no better--as I look upon it. Madam, you think it right to ask me this, I know: but to entertain it is an impossibility."

Sister Mildred dropped her ear-trumpet with a click. The hardness vexed her. And yet she could but acknowledge that it was in a degree excusable. But for the difficulties lying in Jane's path, she had never urged it.

So there the matter rested. Miss Hallet had despatched her new servant to the Nunnery with a portion of Jane's wardrobe: and what on earth was to become of Jane the Sisters were unable to conjecture. They could not keep her: the Nunnery was not a reformatory, or meant to be one. Consulting together, they at last thought of a plan.

Sister Mildred went one morning into Jane's room. Jane was seated at the window in a shawl, busy at her work--some pinafores for the poor little school-children. Her face was prettier than ever and very delicate, her manner deprecating, as she rose and courtesied to the late Superior.

"How are you getting on, Jane?"

"I have nearly finished this one, madam," she answered, holding out the pinafore.

"I don't mean as to work. I mean yourself."

"Oh, I feel nearly quite well now, thank you, madam," replied Jane. "I get stronger every day."

"I was talking about you with some of the ladies last night, Jane. We wonder what you are about to do. Have you any plan, or idea of your own?"

Poor Jane's face took a shade of crimson. She did not answer.

"Not that we wish to hurry you away from us, Jane. You are welcome to stay, and we intend you to do so, for at least two weeks yet. Only it will not do to leave considerations off to the last: this is why I speak to you in time."

Sister Mildred had sat down close by Jane; by bending her ear, she could do without the trumpet. Jane's hands, slender always, and weak yet, shook as she held the pinafore.

"Have you formed any plans, Jane?"

"Oh no, ma'am."

"I thought so," returned Sister Mildred, for indeed she did not see what plans Jane, so lonely and friendless, could form. "When we cannot do what we would, we must do what we can--that used to be one of your copies in small-hand, I remember, Jane."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Well, my dear, I don't want to speak harshly, but I think you must apply it to yourself. You can no longer do what you would: you will have to do what you can. I am sorry to say that your aunt continues inexorable: she will not shelter you again."

Jane turned to the table for her handkerchief. The tears were trickling down her face.

"We--the Sisters and myself--think it will be the best for you to take an easy place as servant----"

"As servant!" echoed Jane, looking startled.

"As servant for light work in a good family far away from here. Sister Margaret thinks she can manage this--her connections are very good, you know. Of course the truth must be told to them; but you will be taken care of, and made happy--we would not else place you--and have the opportunity afforded you of redeeming the past, so far as it may be redeemed. You don't like this, I'm afraid, Jane; but what else is there that's open to you?"

Jane was sobbing bitterly. She suddenly stooped and kissed the Sister's hand; but she made no answer.

"I will talk with you again to-morrow," said Sister Mildred, rising. "Think it over, Jane--and don't sob like that, child. If you can suggest anything better, why we'll listen to it. We only want to help you, and to keep you out of harm for the future."

Jane was very sad and silent all that day. In the evening, after dark, Sister Caroline, who had been out on an errand, came in with rounded eyes, declaring she had seen Jane Hallet out of doors. The ladies reproved her. Sister Caroline often had fancies.

"If it was not Jane Hallet it was her ghost," cried Sister Caroline, lightly. "She was under the cliff by the sea. I never saw anybody so much like Jane in my life."

"Have you been down under the cliff?" questioned Sister Charlotte.

"I went there for a minute or two with poor old Dame Tuff," explained the Sister. "She was looking after Jack, who had been missing since morning: she thought he might be lying under the cliff after too much ale. While we were peering into all the holes and shady places, somebody ran by exactly like Jane."

"Ran by where?"

"Close along, between us and the sea. Towards the Limpets."

"But nobody could want anything that way. They might be drowned."

"Well, it looked like Jane."

"Hush!" said one of the graver ladies. "You know it could not be Jane Hallet. Did you find Jack Tuff?"

"No: his poor mother's gone home crying. What a trouble sons are! But--may I go and see if Jane is in her room?"

It was really very obstinate of Sister Caroline: but she was allowed to go. Down she came with a rush.

Jane was not in her room.

Several of the Sisters, excited by the news, trooped up in a body to see. Very true. The room had been made neat by Jane, but there was no trace of herself. On the table lay some lines in pencil addressed to Sister Mildred.

A few lines of grateful, heartfelt thanks for the kindness shown to her, and an imploring hope that the ladies would think of her with as little harshness as they could. But not a single word to tell of whither she had gone.

"Pray Heaven she has not done anything rash!" mentally cried Sister Mildred with pale cheeks, as she thought of the dangers of the path that led to that part of the coast called the Limpets.