ry, and an idea, occurred
to the latter that delighted him. It was one of the evenings when they
dined together at the Club.... Another day, Cairns inquired of Vina
what took her to Nantucket in summer, curious as to the material
arrangement.

"My own people used to go there summers when I was a little thing," she
told him, "and of late--there are many friends who ask me over."

"Say, Vina, when you get over to Nantucket, would you be terribly
disconcerted to discover some morning, down among the wharves there,
with a copy of _Moby Dick,_ and a distressed look from deciding whether
breakfast should be of clam or cod chowder--_me_?"

"I should be glad of all things," she said with quiet eagerness. "There
are so many ways to pass the hours----"

"Besides walking in Lily Lane in the dusk?"

"Yes.... There's the ride over the open moors. It's like Scotland in
places, with no division or fences, and the sea away off in all
directions. Then, we must go to the lighthouse, one of the most
important of America, and the first to welcome the steamers coming in
from Europe. And the Haunted House on Moor's End, the Prince Gardens
and the wonderful old water-front--where I am to discover you--once so
rich and important in the world, now forgotten and sunken and deserted,
except for an old seasoned sea captain here and there, smoking about,
dreaming as you imagine, of the China trade or the lordly days of the
old sperm fishery, and looking wistfully out toward the last port....
Venice or Nantucket--I can hardly say which is more dream-like or
alluring, or sad with the goneness of its glory.... I'd love to show
you, because I know every stick and stone on the Island, and many of
its quaint people."

"And when do you think you will go?" he asked.

"I don't know, David,--not before the last of June. And I won't be able
to stay very long this year, because there is no place to work there. I
ought to have a little change and rest, but I can't afford to 'run
down' entirely--just enough to freshen the eye."

Cairns nodded seriously....

A day or two afterward he brought Bedient. To Vina he was like some
tremendous vibration in the room. Her mind was roused as if by some
great music.... It was in nothing that Bedient had said or looked, yet
only a little while after the two men had gone, Vina realized she had a
lover in David Cairns.

She was dismayed, filled with confusion and alarm, but this was the
foreground of mind. She had