"Garda is very young." "Why don't you say she's a child! That is what they all say here, I think they say it too much. To be sure, she is only sixteen, barely that, I believe, and with us, girls of that age are immature; but Garda Thorne isn't immature, she talks as maturely as I do." "She does--in some ways," admitted Margaret. "She talks remarkably _well_, if you mean that," responded Mrs. Rutherford, who always felt called upon to differ from her niece. "And she is certainly quite pretty." "She is more than pretty; she is strikingly beautiful." "Oh no, she isn't," replied Mrs. Rutherford, veering again; "you exaggerate. It's only because you see her here in this dull little place." "I think it would be the same anywhere, Aunt Katrina." "Well, we shall not have to compare, fortunately. She will stay here, of course, where she belongs, she will probably marry that young Torres. But that little ill-bred mother's designs upon Evert--that is too amusing. Evert, indeed! Evert has more coolness and discrimination than any man I have ever known." The man of discrimination was at that moment strolling slowly through the St. Luz quarter, on his way to the Benito; he reached it, and walked out its silver floor. The tide was coming in. On that low coast there were no rocks, the waves reached the shore in long, low, unbroken swells, like quiet breathing; they had come evenly in from deep water outside, and now flowed softly up the beach a little way and then back again, with a rippling murmurous sound that was peace itself. Warm as was the land, still dreaming of the sun, the ocean was warmer still; the Gulf Stream flowed by not far from shore, and the air that came from the water was soft on the cheek like a caress. From the many orange groves of the town dense perfume was wafted towards him, he walked through belts of it. At last, at the point's end, he found himself bathed in it; he threw the light overcoat he had been carrying down upon the sand, and stretched himself upon it, with his back against an old boat; lying there, he could look down the harbor and out to sea.