Oh, Emily! Unhappy beauty! What a picture rose before me of her sitting on the far-off shore, among the children like herself when she was innocent, listening to little voices such as might have called her Mother had she been a poor man’s wife; and to the great voice of the sea, with its eternal ‘Never more!’
‘When it was clear that nothing could be done, Miss Dartle -’
‘Did I tell you not to speak to me?’ she said, with stern contempt.
‘You spoke to me, miss,’ he replied. ‘I beg your pardon. But it is my service to obey.’
‘Do your service,’ she returned. ‘Finish your story, and go!’
‘When it was clear,’ he said, with infinite respectability and an obedient bow, ‘that she was not to be found, I went to Mr. James, at the place where it had been agreed that I should write to him, and in
