pointed downwards.

"There is a little path there, you see, leading to the sands," she said.
"It saves you quite half the distance to your cottage if you do not mind
a scramble. You must take care just at first. So many of the stones
are loose."

I understood that I was dismissed, and I thanked her and turned away.
But she almost immediately called me back.

"Mr. Ducaine!"

"Lady Angela?"

Her dark eyes were fixed curiously upon my face. She seemed to be
weighing something in her mind. I had a fancy that when she spoke again
it would be without that deliberation--almost restraint--which seemed to
accord a little strangely with the girlishness of her appearance and
actual years. She stood on the extreme edge of the cliff, her slim
straight figure outlined to angularity against the sky. She remained so
long without speech that I had time to note all these things. The
sunshine, breaking through the thin-topped pine trees, lay everywhere
about us; a little brown feathered bird, scarcely a dozen yards away,
sang to us so lustily that the soft feathers around his throat stood out
like a ruff. Down below the sea came rushing on to the shingles.

"Mr. Ducaine," she said at last, "did my father make you any offer of
employment this afternoon?"

It was a direct, almost a blunt question. I was taken by surprise, but
I answered her without hesitation.

"He made me no definite offer," I said. "At the same time he asked me a
great many questions, for which he must have had some reason, and he
gave me the idea that, subject to the approval of some others, he was
thinking of me in connection with some post."

"Colonel Ray was telling me," she said, "how unfortunate you have been
with your pupils. I wonder--don't you think perhaps that you might get
some others?"

"I have tried," I answered. "So far I have not been lucky. At present,
too, I scarcely see how I could expect to get any, for I have nowhere to
put them. I had to give up the lease of the Grange, and there is no
house round here which I could afford to take."

Some portion of her delicate assurance had certainly deserted her. Her
manner was almost nervous.

"If you could possibly find the pupils," she said, hesitatingly, "I
should like to ask you a favour. The Manor Farm on the other side of
the village is my own, and I should so like it occupied. I would let it
to you furnished for ten pounds a year. There is a man and his wife
living there now as caretakers.