“Most on ’em will go birds’-nestin’ ’round in the bays an’ coves along shore. Some on ’em alluz gits caught, an’ that’s what makes me feel kind er anxious now. You see, my boy Willum has been buyin’ a schooner up to New Brunswick, with a pardner of his, and he’s jest as like as not to be takin’ her down to Boston about now.” “I hope not!” cried Miss Sullivan, shuddering involuntarily in the hot chill of another isolated blast. “Wal, worryin’ won’t mend nothin’,” said the father, with stoic calmness. “Come, Dan’l, we must hurry up with this ’ere hay,” and the two fell to work again; but the face of the elder man was very grave as he glanced, from time to time, at the grey sky and sullen sea. Miss Sullivan strolled on across the meadow to Black Rock Head. There she had often sat in brilliant days and sent her looks and thoughts a-dreaming beyond the misty edge of the ocean world. To-day a strange, dismal heaviness in the air made dreams nightmares. Perpetual calm seemed destined to dwell upon the ocean, so unruffled was its surface and unsuggestive of storms to be. Looking down from the Head, Miss Sullivan would scarcely have discerned the great, slow surges, lifting and falling monotonously. They made themselves felt, however, when they met the opponent crag. A vast chasm stood open in its purple rocks, and as the lazy waves fell upon the unyielding shore, they flowed in, filling this cavernous gulf almost to the brim with foaming masses. Then, as the surge deliberately withdrew, these ambitious waters, abandoned and unsupported, plunged downward in a wild whirlpooling panic, stream overwhelming stream, all seething together furiously, hissing, roaring, thundering, until again they met the incoming breaker, and again essayed as vainly to rise above control and overcome the enduring land. Mists, slowly uprising, had given sunset a dull reception, and the great southeastern cloud-bank was growing fast heavier and heavier. Puffs of driving fog began to hide the mountain and lower down upon the Dempster house. Darkness fell, and at last Miss Sullivan was driven in. CHAPTER V A WRECK AND A RESCUE All night the storm did its tyrannous work over sea and land; all night, around old Dempster’s house, it howled its direful menaces. But the house stood firm, for it had been built to withstand the shock of any storm; only shivered now and then as the gale smote it with heavier hand, then tore on its way lamenting. More than once Miss Sullivan awoke and lay listening to the storm’s wild voices--voices which recalled the past--voices whispering, pleading, sighing, moaning to be heard again and again answered. And they were answered--answered with bitter moans and tears, and at last with prayers for patience and peace, and, if need were, for pardon.