"We were left by ourselves, and we had to get on as we could!" she cried. "Hadn't we, Mr. Turquand? I say we had to amuse ourselves as we could. Now Cynthia's glowering at me! Oh--hee, hee, hee!--you two young people are too respectable for _us_. We don't ask any questions, but--but I daresay Mr. Turquand and I aren't the only _ones_--hee, hee, hee!--who have been 'looking at the moon.'" "Shall we find chairs again?" said Kent quickly, noting the frown that darkened the girl's brow. "It's rather an awkward spot to stand still, isn't it?" She agreed that it was, and a waiter brought them ices, and Mrs. Walford was giddy over a liqueur. They remained at the table until she said that it was time to return to their hotel. Parting from them at its gates, the two men turned away together. Both felt in their pockets, filled their pipes, and, smoking silently, drifted through the rugged little streets to the café where they had had their conversation after dinner. "'Thank you for a very pleasant evening,'" said Turquand, breaking a long pause. It was the only criticism that he permitted himself, and Kent did not care to inquire if it was to be regarded as ironical. CHAPTER III After his friend's departure, the mother and daughter became the pivot round which the author's movements revolved. Primarily his own companionship and the novelty of Dieppe had been enough; but now he found it dreary to roam about the harbour, or to sit sipping mazagrans, alone. Reviewing the weeks before Turquand joined him, he wondered what he had done with himself in various hours of the day. Solitude hung so unfamiliarly on his hands that Miss Walford's society was indispensable. Soon after the chocolate and rolls, he went with the ladies to the Casino, and spent the morning beside them under the awning. Mrs. Walford did not bathe: while people could have comfortable baths in the vicinity of their toilet-tables, she considered that recourse to tents and the sea was making an unnecessary confidence--and she disliked to see Cynthia swim, "with a lot of Frenchmen in the water." Whether it was their sex, or only their nationality, that was the objection was not clear. She usually destroyed a copy of a novel while Mr. Kent and her daughter talked. Considering the speed with which she read it, indeed, it was constantly astonishing to him that she could contrive to do a book so much damage. In the evening they strolled out again, and but for the afternoon he would have had small cause for complaint. Even this gained a spice of excitement, however, from the fact that it was uncertain how long Miss Walford's siesta would last, and there was always the chance, as he lounged about the hotel, smoking to support the tedium, that a door would open and cause heart-leaps.