She still beheld the fiery glare of an expiring
sunset, and against the ensuing pallor of sea and sky a leaden-hued
human, figure strangely, almost portentously evident. That it appeared
noble in pose and in outline, even beautiful, she could not deny. But
that somehow it frightened her, she could equally little deny. So it came
about that once again, as Mary and her satellite Laura silently waited
at table, and as Theresa very audibly gobbled food in and words out,
Damaris shrank within herself seeming to hear a shrill sweet whistling
and the shatter of loose pebbles and shifting shingle under Faircloth's
pursuing feet.
The young man's name aroused her interest, not to say her curiosity, the
more deeply because of its association, with a locality exploration of
which had always been denied her--a Naboth's vineyard of the imagination,
near at hand, daily in sight, yet personal acquaintance with which she
failed to possess even yet. The idea of an island, especially a quite
little island, a miniature and separate world, shut off all by itself, is
dreadfully enticing to the infant mind--at once a geographical entity and
a cunning sort of toy.
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