“Really? Father will wear a crown and a harp for _that_ concession. Did he give you any message from me, I wonder?” “He said the ladies sent their regards.” “Oh! Was that all?” “That was all.” “It was not _quite_ all,” said Helen, after a moment’s rather grave reflection. “But never mind. Probably Father thought the exegesis incorrect somewhere.” “Perhaps he objected to the context?” asked Bayard mischievously. “More likely he had a quarrel in the Faculty on his mind and forgot it.” “If you had written it yourself”--suggested Bayard humbly. “But of course you had other things to do.” Helen gave him an inscrutable look. She made no reply. They passed the fish-house, and the old clam-digger, who was sitting on his overturned basket in the sun, opening clams with a blunt knife, and singing hoarsely:-- “The woman’s ashore, The child’s at the door, The man’s at the wheel. “Storm on the track, Fog at the back, Death at the keel. “You, mate, or me, Which shall it be? God, He won’t tell. Drive on to ----!” “There is Mr. Salt,” said Helen; for the two had come slowly up in silence to the old gate, (fastened with a rope tied in a sailor’s knot), that gave the short cut across the meadow to the Mainsail summer hotel. “He is watching for me. How sober he looks! Perhaps something dreadful has happened to Mrs. Salt. Wait a minute. Let me run in!” She tossed her sun-umbrella, gloves, and saxifrage in a heap across Bayard’s arm, and ran like a girl or a collie swaying across the meadow in the wind. In a few minutes she walked back, flushed and laughing. “Pepper can’t go!” she cried. “He’s got the colic. He’s swallowed a celluloid collar. Mr. Salt says he thought it was sugar. I must go right along and catch the car.” “You have eight minutes yet,” said Bayard joyously, “and I can go too!” The car filled up rapidly; they chatted of little things, or sat in silence. Jane Granite came aboard as they passed her mother’s door. Bayard lifted his hat to her cordially; she was at the further end of the car; she got off at a grocery store, to buy prunes, and did not look back. She had only glanced at Helen Carruth. Bayard did not notice when Jane left. The train came in and went out. Helen stood on the platform leaning over to take her saxifrage: a royal vision, blurring and melting in purple and gold before his eyes. The train came in and went out; her laughing eyes looked back from the frame of the car window. The train went out. He turned away and went slowly home.