panic the necessity of physical activity.

Artois followed her example. He was glad to move.

"Shall we go and see what Vere is doing?" he said.

"If you like. I feel sure she is with Ruffo."

They went towards the house. Artois felt a deep curiosity, which filled
his whole being, to know what Hermione's exact feeling towards Ruffo
was.

"Don't you think," he said, "that perhaps it is a little dangerous to
allow Vere to be so much with a boy from Mergellina?"

"Oh no."

In her tone there was the calm of absolute certainty.

"Well, but we don't know so very much about him."

"Do you think two instincts could be at fault?"

"Two instincts?"

"Vere's and mine?"

"Perhaps not. Then your instinct--"

He waited. He was passionately interested.

"Ruffo is all right," Hermione answered.

It seemed to him as if she had deliberately used that bluff expression
to punish his almost mystical curiosity. Was she warding him off
consciously?

They passed through the house and came out on its further side, but they
did not go immediately to the cliff top. Both of them felt certain the
two children must be there, and both of them, perhaps, were held
back for a moment by a mutual desire not to disturb their innocent
confidences. They stood upon the bridge, therefore, looking down into
the dimness of the Pool. From the water silence seemed to float up to
them, almost visibly, like a lovely, delicate mist--silence, and the
tenderness of night, embracing their distresses.

The satire died out of Hermione's poor, tormented heart. And Artois
for a moment forgot the terrible face half seen in the darkness of the
trees.

"There is the boat. He is here."

Hermione spoke in a low voice, pointing to the shadowy form of a boat
upon the Pool.

"Yes."

Artois gazed at the boat. Was it indeed a Fate that came by night to the
island softly across the sea, ferried by the ignorant hands of men?
He longed to know. And Hermione longed to know something, too: whether
Artois had ever seen the strange likeness she had seen, whether Maurice
had ever seemed to gaze for a moment at him out of the eyes of Ruffo.
But to-night she could not ask him that. They were too far away from
each other. And because of the gulf between them her memory had suddenly
become far more sacred, far more necessary to her even, than it had been
before.

It had been a solace, a beautiful solace. But now it was much more than
that--now it was surely her sa