He fairly had to crouch against this, turning a shoulder to the force of the wind. Here the outthrust of the land gave the storm a sweep across the brow of the cliff while the breakers, charging in from the open sea, flung themselves ravenously against the crumbling wall of sand and clay--an unstable barrier at best. With such a sea as this on, the surfmen from the life-saving station could not patrol the beach itself, and their worn path along the verge of the fifty foot bank was the only footway to the Portuguese's shack. 'Liphalet hesitated. It did not seem as though any woman could successfully face such a gale. The prospect was one to make the strongest man turn back. He shielded his eyes with both hands cupped, and tried to pierce the snow and sleet with a vision long inured to penetrating thick weather. There came a momentary lull in the gale. The sweeping snow parted like a curtain. It fled away over the cliff, and for a space he could see for some distance along the path. Was that a snow wraith hovering there on the brow of the high bank? Or was it a human figure which, the next moment, was swallowed in the snow curtain? 'Liphalet, vastly disturbed by this uncertain specter in the storm, plunged into it himself again and pressed ahead. CHAPTER XXIV THE MISTLETOE BOUGH Until the day before Christmas, ushered in by the long-threatened gale, nobody had seen Joe Helmford along the Shell Road since he had left the Petty place. Cap'n Jonah had been unable to hunt up the young man and learn, if he could, just why he had so abruptly departed from the neighborhood. In spite of the bustle attending the presence of the guests over Sunday and the thorough cleaning up after them which followed, Pearl Holden could not for a moment forget the young man. And her worry of mind was advertised upon her pretty face. There were shadows under her eyes and an unnatural pallor spread over her cheeks. Cap'n Jonah had strong suspicions as to the reason for Pearl's changed appearance, although she would admit nothing. He had watched the intimacy growing day by day between the girl and Helmford, and, arrant matchmaker that he was, he hoped to see its fruition in an acknowledged engagement of the two young people. Should Pearl marry a man like Helmford, one great burden would be lifted from Cap'n Jonah's mind. He often felt that he had done a wrong, a grievous wrong, to the girl in intimating that he had a fortune and would will all or part of it to her. He presumed that Pearl bore this half-promise he had made in mind, just as the Pettys bore it in mind; and having nothing to give Pearl after all, the master mariner's troubles were thereby added to. If the girl was only sure to marry a smart young fellow like Joe Helmford----