was it?' he asked Nataly.

'I forget,' said she.

He glanced at her: a cloud had risen. He rallied her, spoke of the old
Norman silver cross which the manager of the Concert had sent, humbly
imploring her to accept the small memento of his gratitude. She nodded
an excellent artificial brightness.

And there was the coast of France under young sunlight over the waters.
Once more her oft-petitioning wish through the years, that she had
entered the ranks of professional singers, upon whom the moral scrutiny
is not so microscopic, invaded her, resembling a tide-swell into rock-
caves, which have been filled before and left to emptiness, and will be
left to emptiness again. Nataly had the intimation visiting us when,
in a decline of physical power, the mind's ready vivacity to conjure
illusions forsakes us; and it was, of a wall ahead, and a force impelling
her against it, and no hope of deviation. And this is the featureless
thing, Destiny; not without eyes, if we have a conscience to throw them
into it to look at us.

Counsel to her to live in the hour, came, as upon others on the vessel,
from an active breath of the salt prompting to healthy hunger; and hardly
less from the splendour of the low full sunlight on the waters, the
skimming and dancing of the thousands of golden shells away from under
the globe of fire.