t moment of her life. As she looked
from one to the other of us, with the cold morning sun glittering on her
face, I had never seen her look so lovely. Jim felt it also, I am sure;
for he dropped her wrist, and the harsh lines were softened upon his
face.

"Come, Edie! which is it to be?" he asked.

"Naughty boys, to fall out like this!" she cried. "Cousin Jack, you
know how fond I am of you."

"Oh, then go to him!" said Horscroft.

"But I love nobody but Jim. There is nobody that I love like Jim."

She snuggled up to him, and laid her cheek against his breast.

"You see, Jock!" said he, looking over her shoulder.

I did see; and away I went for West Inch, another man from the time that
I left it.

CHAPTER V.

THE MAN FROM THE SEA.

Well, I was never one to sit groaning over a cracked pot. If it could
not be mended, then it is the part of a man to say no more of it.
For weeks I had an aching heart; indeed, it is a little sore now, after
all these years and a happy marriage, when I think of it. But I kept a
brave face on me; and, above all, I did as I had promised that day on
the hillside. I was as a brother to her, and no more: though there were
times when I had to put a hard curb upon myself; for even now she would
come to me with her coaxing ways, and with tales about how rough Jim
was, and how happy she had been when I was kind to her; for it was in
her blood to speak like that, and she could not help it.

But for the most part Jim and she were happy enough. It was all over
the countryside that they were to be married when he had passed his
degree, and he would come up to West Inch four nights a week to sit with
us. My folk were pleased about it, and I tried to be pleased too.

Maybe at first there was a little coolness between him and me: there was
not quite the old schoolboy trust between us. But then, when the first
smart was passed, it seemed to me that he had acted openly, and that I
had no just cause for complaint against him. So we were friendly, in a
way; and as for her, he had forgotten all his anger, and would have
kissed the print of her shoe in the mud. We used to take long rambles
together, he and I; and it is about one of these that I now want to tell
you.

We had passed over Bramston Heath and round the clump of firs which
screens the house of Major Elliott from the sea wind. It was spring
now, and the year was a forward one, so that the trees were well leaved
by the