could ye do it, Avice?'

'I--I didn't think about how I was altered!' said the conscience-
stricken girl. 'I used to kiss him, and he used to kiss me before he
went away.'

'But that was years ago, my dear!'

'O yes, and for the moment I forgot! He seemed just the same to me as
he used to be.'

'Well, it can't be helped now. You must be careful in the future.
He's got lots of young women, I'll warrant, and has few thoughts left
for you. He's what they call a sculptor, and he means to be a great
genius in that line some day, they do say.'

'Well, I've done it; and it can't be mended!' moaned the girl.

Meanwhile Jocelyn Pierston, the sculptor of budding fame, had gone
onward to the house of his father, an inartistic man of trade and
commerce merely, from whom, nevertheless, Jocelyn condescended to
accept a yearly allowance pending the famous days to come. But the
elder, having received no warning of his son's intended visit, was not
at home to receive him. Jocelyn looked round the familiar premises,
glanced across the Common at the great yards within which eternal saws
were going to and fro upon eternal blocks of stone--the very same saws
and the very same blocks that he had seen there when last in the
island, so it seemed to him--and then passed through the dwelling into
the back garden.