"Why don't you come down to the beach?"
"Don't want to. Cis, I'm going to have it out with my father, this
afternoon."
She nodded slowly.
"Yes, you may as well. It's about time."
He turned away and started down the narrow road through the town. She
stood looking after him for a moment; then she called,--
"Mayn't I go, too, Allyn?"
"If you want to. I sha'n't be back in time for the bathing hour, though,"
he answered; but his eyes belied the scant cordiality of his words.
For more than an hour, they sat on the high bluff that juts seaward at
the south of the town. On the one hand, the sea stretched away, its deep
sapphire blue only broken by the diagonal white line that marked the
rips; on the other were the treeless moors looking in the changing lights
like a vast expanse of pinkish brown plush. Directly at their feet, the
little bowl of Kidd's Pond lay among its rushes like a turquoise ringed
about with malachite; beyond it was the grey village, and beyond again,
the lighthouse whose tall white tower by day and whose flashing light at
night are the beacons which seem to welcome the wanderers of the summer
colony, whenever their steps are turned back to Quantuck.
At length, Cicely rose to her feet.
"We must go, Allyn. Here is the noon train now, and we shall be late
to dinner."
But the boy did not stir.
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