run with the wind. All that night you might see him sailing in the
moonlight, and he would come home in the flush of the dawn.

"After he had built the house, he furnished it, crossing for that
purpose backwards and forwards between Tresco and St. Mary's. I
remember that one day he brought back with him a large chest, and I
offered to lend him a hand in carrying it. But he hoisted it on his
back and took it no farther than the cottage in which he lived, where
it remained locked with a padlock.

"Towards Christmas-time, then, the house was ready, but to our
surprise he did not move into it. He seemed, indeed, of a sudden, to
have lost all liking for it, and whether it was that he had no longer
any work upon his hands, he took to following Mrs. Lovyes about, but
in a way that was unnoticeable unless you had other reasons to suspect
that his thoughts were following her.

"His conduct in this respect was particularly brought home to me on
Christmas Day. The afternoon was warm and sunny, and I walked over the
hill at Merchant's Point, meaning to bathe in the little sequestered
bay beyond. From the top of the hill I saw Mrs. Lovyes walking along
the strip of beach alone, and as I descended the hill-side, which
is very deep in fern and heather, I came plump upon Jarvis Grudge,
stretched full-length on the ground. He was watching Mrs. Lovyes with
so greedy a concentration of his senses that he did not remark my
approach. I asked him when he meant to enter his new house.

"'I do not know that I ever shall,' he replied.

"'Then why did you build it?' I asked.