How brightly the stars shone, how clearly the music of the stream came
over the hedge! With what lazy restfulness the distant All's well
floated across the mielles from a ship at anchor in the tide-way, how
like a slumber-song the wash of the sea rolled drowsily along the wind!
How gracious the smell of the earth, drinking up the dew of the affluent
air, which the sun, on the morrow, should turn into life-blood for the
grass and trees and flowers!




CHAPTER XVII

Philip was gone. Before breakfast was set upon the table, Guida saw the
Narcissus sail round Noirmont Point and disappear.

Her face had taken on a new expression since yesterday. An old touch of
dreaminess, of vague anticipation was gone--that look which belongs to
youth, which feels the confident charm of the unknown future. Life was
revealed; but, together with joy, wonder and pain informed the
revelation.

A marvel was upon her. Her life was linked to another's, she was a wife.
She was no longer sole captain of herself. Philip would signal, and she
must come until either he or she should die. He had taken her hand, and
she must never let it go; the breath of his being must henceforth give
her new and healthy life, or inbreed a fever which should corrode the
heart and burn away the spirit. Young though she was, she realised it--
but without defining it. The new-found knowledge was diffused in her
character, expressed in her face.