tood Maurice, dressed from head to foot
in flannel, and with a jaunty sailor's hat, secured with an elastic
cord under his chin. He was gazing with an air of preoccupation up
toward the farm, above which the white edge of the glacier hung
gleaming against the dim horizon. Above it the fog rose like a dense
gray wall, hiding the destructive purpose which was even at this
moment laboring within. Some minutes elapsed. Maurice grew impatient,
then anxious. He pulled his note-book from his pocket, examined some
pages covered with calculations, dotted a neglected _i_, crossed a
_t_, and at last closed the book with a desperate air. Presently some
dark figure was seen striding down the hill-side, and the black
satellite, Jake, appeared, streaming with mud and perspiration.

"Well, you wretched laggard," cried Maurice, as he caught sight of
him, "what answer?"

"Nobody answered nothing at all," responded Jake, all out of breath.
"They be all gone. Aboard the ship, out there. All rigged, ready to
sail."

A few minutes later there was a slight commotion on board the brig
_Queen Anne_. A frolicsome tar had thrown out a rope, and hauled in
two men one white and one black. The crew thronged about them,

"English, eh?"

"No; American."

"Yankees? Je-ru-salem! Saw your rig wasn't right, somehow."

General hilarity. Witty tar looks around with an air of magnanimous
deprecation.

A strange feeling of exultation had taken possession of Maurice. The
light and the air suddenly seemed glorious to him. He knew the world
misjudged his action; but he felt no need of its vindication. He was
rather inclined to chuckle over its mistake, as if it and not he were
the sufferer. He walked with rapid steps toward the prow of the ship,
where. Tharald and Elsie were standing. There was a look of
invincibility in his eye which made the old man quail before him.
Elsie's face suddenly brightened, as if flooded with light from
within; she made an impulsive movement toward him, and then stood
irresolute.

"Elsie," called out her father, with a husky tremor in his voice. "Let
him alone, I tell thee. He might leave us in peace now. He has driven
from hearth and home." Then, with indignant energy, "He shall not
touch thee, child. By the heavens, he shall not."

Maurice smiled, and with the same sense of serene benignity, wholly
unlover-like, clasped her in his arms.

A wild look flashed in the father's eyes; a hoarse groan broke from
his chest.