'But life's so full of anti-climax,' she concluded. Siegmund smiled
softly at her. She had him too much in love to disagree or to examine
her words.

'There's no reckoning with life, and no reckoning with the sea. The only
way to get on with both is to be as near a vacuum as possible, and
float,' he jested. It hurt her that he was flippant. She proceeded to
forget he had spoken.

There were three children on the beach. Helena had handed him back the
senseless bauble, not able to throw it away. Being a father:

'I will give it to the children,' he said.

She looked up at him, loved him for the thought.

Wandering hand in hand, for it pleased them both to own each other
publicly, after years of conventional distance, they came to a little
girl who was bending over a pool. Her black hair hung in long snakes to
the water. She stood up, flung back her locks to see them as they
approached. In one hand she clasped some pebbles.

'Would you like this? I found it down there,' said Siegmund, offering
her the bulb.

She looked at him with grave blue eyes and accepted his gift. Evidently
she was not going to say anything.

'The sea brought it all the way from the mainland without breaking it,'
said Helena, with the interesting intonation some folk use to children.