go with him, and forbidding by her fierce insistence any attempt of his
at explanation; she condemned herself to perpetual remorse with even
greater zeal than her mother would have sentenced her, and she would not
permit herself any respite when a little sail, which she knew for theirs,
blew round the point. It seemed to fly along just on the hither side of
that mural darkness, skilfully tacking to reach the end of the-reef
before the wall pushed it on the rocks. Suddenly, the long low stretch of
the reef broke into white foam, and then passed from sight under the
black wall, against which the little sail still flickered. The girl
fetched a long, silent breath. They were inside the reef, in
comparatively smooth water, and to her ignorance they were safe. But the
rain would be coming in another moment, and Mrs. Maynard would be
drenched; and Grace would be to blame for her death. She ran to the
closet, and pulled down her mother's India-rubber cloak and her own, and
fled out-of-doors, to be ready on the beach with the wrap, against their
landing. She met the other ladies on the stairs and in the hall, and they
clamored at her; but she glided through them like something in a dream,
and then she heard a shouting in her ear, and felt herself caught and
held up against the wind.

"Where in land be you goin', Miss Breen?"

Barlow, in a long, yellow oil-skin coat and sou'wester hat, kept pushing
her forward to the edge of the cliff, as he asked.

"I'm going down to meet them!" she screamed.

"Well, I hope you WILL meet 'em. But I guess you better go back to the
house. Hey? WUNT? Well; come along, then, if they ain't past doctorin' by
the time they git ashore! Pretty well wrapped up, any way!" he roared;