could not understand him,--not his homely, keen little face
even. The eyes held their own thought, and never answered yours; but on
the mouth there was a forlorn depression sometimes, like that of a man
who, in spite of his fame, felt himself alone and neglected. It rested
there now, as he idly fingered the chessmen.

"Mary will kiss it away in time, maybe,"--doubting, as he said it,
whether Mary did not come nearer the man's head than his heart. He
stopped, looking out of the hole by the ladder that served the purpose
of a window.

"It grows blacker every minute. I shall begin to repent tempting you on
such a harebrained expedition, Doctor."

"No. This Van Note seems a cautious sailor enough," carelessly.

"Yes. He's on his own ground, too. We ought to run into Squan Inlet by
morning. Did you speak?"

Birkenshead shook his head; the Doctor noticed, however, that his hand
had suddenly stopped moving the chessmen; he rested his chin in the
other.

"Some case he has left worries him," he thought. "He's not the man to
relish this wild-goose chase of mine. It's bad enough for Mary to jar
against his quiet tastes with her reforming whims, without my"----

"I would regret bringing you here," he said aloud, "if I did not think
you would find a novelty in this shore and people. This coast is hardly
'canny,' as MacAulay would say. It came, literally, out of the sea.
Sometime, ages ago, it belonged to the bed of the ocean, and it never
has reconciled itself to the life of the land; its Flora is different
from that of the boundaries; if you dig a few feet into its marl, you
find layers of shells belonging to deep soundings, sharks' teeth and
bones, and the like. The people, too, have a 'marvellously fishy and
ancient smell.'"

The little man at the table suddenly rose, pushing the chessmen from
him.

"What is there to wonder at?"--with a hoarse, unnatural laugh. "That's
Nature. You cannot make fat pastures out of sea-sand, any more than a
thorough-blood _gentilhomme_ out of a clam-digger. The shark's teeth
will show, do what you will." He pulled at his whiskers nervously, went
to the window, motioning Doctor Bowdler roughly aside. "Let me see what
the night is doing."

The old gentleman stared in a grave surprise. What had he said to
startle Birkenshead so utterly out of himself? The color had left his
face at the first mention of this beach; his very voice was changed,
coarse and thick, as if some other man had brok