He put out his hand and gently took the volume from her. “I see that you have been reading about Undine,” he said, tentatively. She flushed a bright rose color; it was the second time he had ever seen her color change. “Ah!” she cried, in a pale reflection of her old mocking defiance. “The story you told me about--I’m sorry, you know, but, really, I don’t find it very interesting.” Stephen looked at her. “Elfie----” he said, but she stretched out her hand in sudden embarrassment. “Give it back to me, please,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to be reading it now. Give it to me, please.” For a moment Stephen stared at her, bewildered at this sudden intensity of appeal. With her old impulsiveness, she flung out her arm to snatch the betraying volume from his grasp. The laces of her sleeve fell back, and there about her wrist Stephen beheld a bracelet--a string of large, irregular pearls, rimmed and linked in silver. He dropped the book and seized the hand in both of his own. “So you still think of me sometimes, Elfie?” She glanced up at him, frowning. “Why did you go away without saying good-by to me last month?” she asked, with her old air of severity. “I didn’t want to bother you. I knew you didn’t care.” Beneath the rigid inquisition of her gaze, Stephen stumbled over his words. “You thought I didn’t care!” She turned her eyes away from him, and twisted the bracelet upon her wrist. “Do _you_ care?” she asked, abruptly. “Elfrida, you know why I had to come back. You know that I care about nothing else in the world but just you--dear, dearest little Elfie!” She stepped back. “And yet,” she said, with a catch in her voice, “you went away and left me.” “But, Elfie dear, what else could I do? After you had laughed at me, after you had refused to let me touch as much as your book when you dropped it here on the beach!” She began to laugh brokenly. “Don’t you understand?” she said, softly. “I wasn’t going to let you know how silly I was. I couldn’t let you see that I had sent for the book for myself--just because I wanted to read again the story that you had told to me.” “Elfie! My own dear Elfie!” She raised her hand. “No, Stephen, one moment! Listen to me.” She leaned toward him a little, standing there white and slender in the gathering dusk, while Stephen listened eagerly. The little waves lapped and gurgled through the rocky spaces of the breakwater; all about them was the quiet evening of the sea.