With a weary sigh, she took up her straw
bonnet and her light muslin scarf from the side-
table upon which she had thrown them on
coming in; and carelessly led the way to the
door. Captain Wragge followed her to the
garden-gate— then stopped, struck by a new
idea.

"Excuse me," he whispered, confidentially.
"In my wife's existing state of ignorance as to
who she is, we had better not trust her alone in
the house with a new servant. I'll privately
turn the key on her, in case she wakes before we
come back. Safe bind, safe find— you know the
proverb! I will be with you again in a
moment."

He hastened back to the house; and Magdalen
seated herself on the garden-wall to await his
return.

She had hardly settled herself in that position,
when two gentlemen walking together, whose
approach along the public path she had not
previously noticed, passed close by her.

The dress of one of the two strangers showed
him to be a clergyman. His companion's station
in life was less easily discernible to ordinary
observation. Practised eyes would probably have seen
enough in his look, his manner, and his walk, to
show that he was a sailor. He was a man in the
prime of life; tall, spare, and muscular; his face
sunburnt to a deep brown; his black hair just
turning grey; his eyes dark, deep, and firm— the
eyes of a man with an iron resolution, and a habit
of command. He was the nearest of the two to
Magdalen, as he and his friend passed the place
where she was sitting; and he looked at her with
a sudden surprise at her beauty, with an open,
hearty, undisguised admiration, which was too
evidently sincere, too evidently beyond his own
control to be justly resented as insolent— and yet,
in her humour at that moment, Magdalen did
resent it. She felt the man's resolute black eyes
strike through her with an electric suddenness;
and frowning at him impatiently, she turned
away her head, and looked back at the house.

The next moment she glanced round again, to
see if he had gone on. He had advanced a few
yards— had then evidently stopped— and was now
in the very act of turning to look at her once
more. His companion, the clergyman, noticing
that Magdalen appeared to be annoyed, took him
familiarly by the arm; and, half in jest, half in
earnest, forced him to walk on. The two
disappeared round the corner of the next house. As
they turned it, the sunburnt sailor twice stopped
his companion again, and twice looked back.

"A friend of yours?" inquired Captain Wragge,
joining Magdalen at that moment.

"Certainly not," she replied, "a perfect
stranger. He stared at me in the most
impertinent manner. Does he belong to this place?"

"I'll find out in a moment," said the
compliant captain; joining the group of boatmen,
and putting his questions right and left, with the
easy familiarity which distinguished him. He
returned in a few minutes with a complete
budget of information. The clergyman was well
known as the rector of a place situated some few
miles inland. The dark man with him, was his
wife's brother, commander of a ship in the
merchant service. He was supposed to be staying
with his relatives, as their guest for a short time
only, preparatory to sailing on another voyage.
The clergyman's name was Strickland, and the
merchant captain's name was Kirke— and that
was all the boatmen knew about either of them.

"It is of no consequence who they are," said
Magdalen, carelessly. "The man's rudeness
merely annoyed me for the moment. Let us have
done with him. I have something else to think
of— and so have you. Where is the solitary walk
you mentioned just now? Which way do we
go?"

The captain pointed southward, towards
Slaughden, and offered his arm.

Magdalen hesitated before she took it. Her
eyes wandered away inquiringly to Noel
Vanstone's house. He was out in the garden; pacing
backwards and forwards over the little lawn,
with his head high in the air, and with Mrs.
Lecount demurely in attendance on him,
carrying her master's green fan. Seeing this,
Magdalen at once took Captain Wragge's right arm,
so as to place herself nearest to the garden when
they passed it on their walk.

"The eyes of our neighbours are on us; and
the least your niece can do is to take your arm,"
she said, with a bitter laugh. "Come! let us go
on."

"They are looking this way," whispered the
captain. "Shall I introduce you to Mrs.
Lecount?"

"Not to-night," she answered. "Wait, and
hear what I have to say to you first."

They passed the garden-wall. Captain Wragge
took off his hat with a smart flourish, and
received a gracious bow from Mrs. Lecount in
return. Magdalen saw the housekeeper survey
her face, her figure, and her dress, with that
reluctant interest, that distrustful curiosity, which
women feel in observing each other. As she
walked on beyond the house, the sharp voice of
Mr. Noel Vanstone reached her through the
evening stillness. "A fine girl, Lecount," she
heard him say. "You know I am a judge of that
sort of thing— a fine girl!"

As those words were spoken, Captain Wragge
looked round at his companion, in sudden
surprise. Her hand was trembling violently on his
arm, and her lips were fast closed with an
expression of speechless pain.

Slowly and in silence the two walked on, until
they reached the southern limit of the houses,
and entered on a little wilderness of shingle and
withered grass— the desolate end of Aldborough,
the lonely beginning of Slaughden.

It was a dull airless evening. Eastward was
the grey majesty of the sea, hushed in
breathless calm; the horizon line invisibly melting into
the monotonous misty sky; the idle ships
shadowy and still on the idle Avater. Southward, the