e was his
and Rosalind's--a part of _their_ existence, a necessity. It was
easy and natural for him to dissociate the living, breathing reality
that filled so much of their lives from its mere beginnings. It was
less easy for Rosalind, but not an impossibility altogether, helped
by the forgiveness for the past that grew from the soil of her
daughter's love.

"You _had_ forgotten, dear," she repeated; "but you know now."

"Yes, I had forgotten, because of Sally herself; but she is _my_
daughter now...."

She waited, expecting him to say more; but he did not speak again. As
soon as he was, or seemed to be, asleep, she rose quietly and left him.

She was so anxious that no trace of the tempest that had passed over
her should be left for Sally to see in the morning that she got as
quickly as possible to bed; and, with a little effort to tranquillise
her mind, soon sank into a state of absolute oblivion. It was the
counterswing of the pendulum--Nature's protest against a strain beyond
her powers to bear, and its remedy.

CHAPTER XLIV

OF A CONTRACT JOB FOR REPAIRS. HOW FENWICK HAD ANOTHER SLEEPLESS NIGHT
AFTER ALL. WHICH IS WHICH, NOW OR TWENTY ODD YEARS AGO? HOW SALLY
FOLLOWED JEREMIAH OUT. WHAT A LOT OF TALK ABOUT A LIFE-BELT!

A colourless dawn chased a grey twilight from the sea and white cliffs
of St. Sennans, and a sickly effort of the sun to rise visibly,
ending above a cloud-bank in a red half-circle that seemed a thing
quite unconnected with the struggling light, was baffled by a higher
cloud-bank still that came discouragingly from the west, and quenched
the hopes of the few early risers who were about as St. Sennans
tower chimed six. The gull that flew high above the green waste of
white-flecked waters was whiter still against the inky blue of the
cloud-curtain that had disallowed the day, and the paler vapour-drifts
that paused and changed and lost themselves and died; but the air that
came from the sea was sweet and mild for the time of year, and the
verdict of the coastguardsman at the flagstaff, who in pursuance of
his sinecure had seen the night out, was that the day was pretty sure
to be an uncertain sart, with little froshets on the water, like over
yander. He seemed to think that a certainty of uncertainty had all the
value of a forecast, and was as well satisfied with his report as he
was that he had not seen a smuggler through the telescope he closed
as he uttered it.

"Well, I sho