the sea might not moderate the bitter-sweet aroma of decay that swam
beneath the unmoving branches; and this mournful fragrance of dying
Autumn wrought upon Amber's mood as might a whiff of some exquisite
rare perfume revive a poignant memory in the bosom of a bereaved lover.
His glance grew aimless, his temper as purposeless, lively anticipation
giving way to a retrospection tinged with indefinable sadness.

Then into the silence crept a sound to rouse him from his formless
reverie: at first a mere pulsing in the stillness, barely to be
distinguished from the song of the surf; but presently a pounding, ever
louder and more insistent. He paused, attentive; and while he waited
the drumming, minute by minute gaining in volume, swept swiftly toward
him--the rhythmic hoofbeats of a single horse madly ridden. When it was
close upon him he stepped back into the tangled undergrowth, making
room; for the track was anything but wide.

Simultaneously there burst into view, at the end of a brief aisle of
trees, the horse--a vigorous black brute with white socks and
muzzle--running freely, apparently under constraint neither of whip nor
of spur. In the saddle a girl leaned low over the horn--a girl with
eyes rapturous, face brilliant, lips parted in the least of smiles. A
fold of her black habit-skirt, whipping out, almost snapped in Amber's
face, so close to him she rode; yet she seemed not to see him, and very
likely did not. A splendid sketch in black-and-white, of youthful
spirit and joy of motion: so she passed and was gone....

Hardly, however, had the forest closed upon the picture, ere a cry, a
heavy crashing as of a horse threshing about in the underbrush, and a
woman's scream of terror, sent Amber, in one movement, out into the
road again and running at a pace which, had he been conscious of it,