r been born. Job got a new family and
was content, but that's their Eastern way. It's different with us
Englishmen."

He stumbled on for a hundred yards or more, vacuously, almost drunkenly,
for the hideous agony that he was enduring half paralysed his brain, and
by its very excess was bringing him some temporary relief. He looked at
the raging sea to his right, and in a vague fashion wished that it had
swallowed him. He looked at the kind earth of the ploughed field to his
left, and wished vividly, for the idea was more familiar, that six feet
of it lay above him. Then he remembered that just beyond that sand-heap
he had found a plover's nest with two eggs in it fifty years ago when
he was a boy, and had taken one egg and left the other, or rather had
restored it because the old bird screamed so pitifully about him. In
some strange manner that little, long-forgotten act of righteousness
brought a glow of comfort to his tormented spirit. Perhaps God would
deal so by him.

In its way the evening was very beautiful. The cold November day was
dying into night. Clear, clear was the sky save for some black and heavy
snow clouds that floated on it driven before the easterly wind that
piped through the sere grasses and blew the plovers over him as though
they were dead leaves. Where the sun had vanished long bars of purple
lay above the horizon; to his excited fancy they looked like the gateway
of another and a better world, set, as the old Egyptians dreamed, above
the uttermost pylons of the West. What lay there beyond the sun? Oh!
what lay beyond the sun? Perhaps, even now, Barbara knew!

A figure appeared standing upon a sand dune between the pathway and the
sea. Septimus was short-sighted and could not tell who it was, but in
this place at this hour doubtless it must be a parishioner, perhaps
one waiting to see him upon some important matter. He must forget his
private griefs. He must strive to steady his shaken mind and attend to
his duties. He drew himself together and walked on briskly.

"I wish I had not been obliged to give away Jack," he said. "He was a
great companion, and somehow I always met people with more confidence
when he was with me; he seemed to take away my shyness. But the license
was seven-and-sixpence, and I haven't got seven-and-sixpence; also he
has an excellent home with that stuffy old woman, if a dull one, for he
must miss his walk. Oh! it's you, Anthony. What are you doing here at
this time of