ad just
bought to carry on business for himself with men under him, the boat
capsized in a sudden squall, and neither he nor the two other men were
ever seen or heard of again. Then to Louise, in her sudden poverty and
despair (for all the savings had been put into the fishing smack) came
Peter once more, and with his frank, whole-hearted love, and his
strength and confidence, fairly carried her off her feet, making her
happy with or without her own consent, in such shelter and comfort as
his fisherman's home could supply. They had been married seven years
now, and had on the whole been happy together; and as she answered his
"Well, my child, how goes it with thee to-day?" her own face lighted up
with a reflection of the beam on his.

After she had heard of the haul of mackerel, and had got Peter his
breakfast, she stood with her arms akimbo looking at him, as he gulped
down his bouillon with huge satisfaction.

The expectant look had not left her eyes, as, fixing them upon his, she
said, "I had a fright last night, my friend."

"Hein! How was that?" said he, with the spoon in his mouth.

"I heard a step outside, and Josef heard it too and barked; and we went
all round with a torch, but there was nobody."

"Ho! ho!" cried Peter, with his hearty laugh, "she will always hear a
step, or the wing of a sea-swallow flying overhead, or perhaps a crab
crawling in the bay, if Peter is not at home to take care of her."

"But indeed," said Louise, "it is the truth I am telling thee: it was
the step of a man, and of one that halted in his gait."

"Did Josef hear it--this step that halted?"

"Yes, he barked till I set him free: then all in a moment he stopped,
and would not search."

"Pou-ouf," crowed Peter, in jovial scorn. "Surely it was Josef
that was the wisest." Then, as she still seemed unsatisfied, he
added, "May-be 'twas the water in the smuggler's cave. Many's
the time that I've thought somebody was coming along, sort of
limping--cluck--chu--cluck--chu--when the tide was half-way up in the
cave over there. And the wind was blowing west last night: 'tis with a
west wind it sounds the plainest."

"May-be 'twas that, my friend," said the woman, taking up the pail to
fetch the water from the well across the common. But she kept looking
around her, with a half-frightened, half-expectant glance, all the way.

CHAPTER II.

For several days the halting step was not heard again, and Louise had
nearly forgotten her f