making eyes at each
other for such frivolity, worshipped at the love-god's shrine. Such
public worship, however, has ever been considered bad form at
Ottermouth, except among septuagenarians and the rosy-cheeked couples
who on Sundays "walk out" together in the country lanes.

Perhaps it was because of this unwritten law of the place that Reggie
Beauchamp and Enid Mallory, having duly greeted each other with flippant
discourtesy, but having the germ of quite another sentiment in their
irresponsible hearts, intuitively turned their steps to the further end
of the parade, and came to a halt at the spot where the struggle between
the feeble efforts of the urban council and the giant forces of nature
ceased. In front lay the bank of shingle across the former river's
mouth; to the left stretched the sedge-covered, dyke-sected bed of the
old estuary.

"Shall we go back to the parade or take a turn up the marsh?" asked
Reggie. And then, without waiting for a reply, he added, "By Jingo! Look
out to sea. There is a cruiser--the _Terrible_, I think, or one of her
class."

Enid followed the direction of his pointing finger, and in the
fast-fading twilight saw the great four-funnelled monster steaming
slowly about two miles out at sea. Even as they looked, the big warship
became little more than a huge blurred shape, barely discernible in the
darkness that was swiftly blotting out land and sea.

"Well, she won't bite, I suppose," said the girl carelessly.

"No, but she might bark," laughed the Lieutenant. "I expect she's out
for night practice with her heavy guns--with blank charges, of course."

The young people quickly lost interest in the ship, and, turning aside,
struck into the path traversed by Leslie Chermside and Levison on the
morning of the preceding day. It was raised above the level of the
mud-flats which skirted it on the right; on the other side rose the
umbrageous bank of the old water-course, increasing the shadows in which
they walked.

Presently Enid's hand stole under her companion's arm, and they glided
naturally into the frank comradeship which had prevailed between them
long before the mutual banter which they had lately affected, and which
was probably due to a desire to conceal the first stirrings of something
stronger than a boy-and-girl attachment. They were both of the age when
young folk are supremely susceptible, but have a self-conscious dread of
being thought so. Out here on the marsh, in the