rce flames scorched her cheek as she spoke, the
wind of their roaring progress swept her hair. He lifted her over
without further consultation, and still kept her in his care.

There was a strange atmosphere on board the little vessels, as they
labored about and parted from the doomed Osprey. Many were subdued with
awe and joy at their deliverance; others broke the tense strain of the
last hours in suffocating sobs. Every throb of the panting engines they
answered with waiting heart-beats, as it sent them farther from the
fearful wonder, now blazing in multiplex lines of fire against the gray
horizon. Mr. Raleigh gazed after it as one watches the conflagration of
a home. Marguerite left her quiet weeping to gaze with him. An hour
silently passed, and as the fiery phantom faded into dawn and distance
she sang sweetly the first few lines of an old French hymn. Another
voice took up the measure, stronger and clearer; those who knew nothing
of the words caught the spirit of the tune; and no choral service ever
pealed up temple-vaults with more earnest accord than that in which this
chant of grateful, exultant devotion now rose from rough-throated men
and weary women in the crisp air and yellowing spring-morning.

As the moment of parting approached, Marguerite stood with folded hands
before Mr. Raleigh, looking sadly down the harbor.

"I regret all that," she said,--"these days that seem years."

"An equivocal phrase," he replied, with a smile.

"But you know what I mean. I am going to strangers; I have been with
you. I shall find no one so kind to me as you have been, Monsieur."

"Your strangers can be much kinder to you than I have been."

"Never! I wish they did not exist! What do I care for them? What do they
care for me? They do not know me; I shall shock them. I miss you, I hate
them, already. _Non! Personne ne m'aime, et je n'aime personne!_" she
exclaimed, with low-toned vehemence.

"Rite," began Mr. Raleigh.

"Rite! No one but my mother ever called me that. How did you know it?"

"I have met your mother, and I knew you a great many years ago."

"Mr. Raleigh!" And there was the least possible shade of unconscious
regret in the voice before it added,--"And what was I?"

"You were some little wood-spirit, the imp of a fallen cone, mayhap, or
the embodiment of birch-tree shadows. You were a soiled and naughty
little beauty, not so different from your present self, and who kissed
me on the lips." "And did y