SOMETHING TO WORRY ABOUT


A girl stood on the shingle that fringes Millbourne Bay, gazing at the
red roofs of the little village across the water. She was a pretty
girl, small and trim. Just now some secret sorrow seemed to be
troubling her, for on her forehead were wrinkles and in her eyes a look
of wistfulness. She had, in fact, all the distinguishing marks of one
who is thinking of her sailor lover.

But she was not. She had no sailor lover. What she was thinking of was
that at about this time they would be lighting up the shop-windows in
London, and that of all the deadly, depressing spots she had ever
visited this village of Millbourne was the deadliest.

The evening shadows deepened. The incoming tide glistened oilily as it
rolled over the mud flats. She rose and shivered.

'Goo! What a hole!' she said, eyeing the unconscious village morosely.
'_What_ a hole!'

* * * * *

This was Sally Preston's first evening in Millbourne. She had arrived
by the afternoon train from London--not of her own free will. Left to
herself, she would not have come within sixty miles of the place.
London supplied all that she demanded from life. She had been born in
London; she had lived there ever since--she hoped to die there. She
liked fogs, motor-buses, noise, policemen, paper-boys, shops, taxi-cabs,