The long July afternoon wore on. The sun that had blazed all day like a wheel of fire, dropped lower and lower into the crimson west. The wide sea shone red with the reflections of the lurid glory in the heavens, and the numberless waves glittered and flashed as if sown with stars. A faint, far-off breeze swept over the sea, salt and cold; and the fishermen's boats danced along with the red sunset glinting on their sails. Up and down, slowly and thoughtfully, the lady walked, her eyes fixed on the wide sea. As the rising breeze met her, she drew the scarlet shawl she wore over her black silk dress closer around her, and glanced at her boy. The little fellow was running over the sands, tossing pebbles into the surf, and hunting for shells; and her eyes left him and wandered once more to the lurid splendor of that sunset on the sea. It was very quiet here, with no living thing in sight but themselves; so the lady's start of astonishment was natural when, turning an abrupt angle in the path leading to the shore, she saw a man coming toward her over the sands. A tall, powerful-looking man of thirty, bronzed and handsome, and with an unmistakably military air, although in plain black clothes. The lady took a second look, then stood stock still, and gazed like one in a dream. The man approached, lifted his hat, and stood silent and grave before her. "Captain Everard!" "Yes, Lady Thetford--after eight years--Captain Everard again." The deep, strong voice suited the bronzed, grave face, and both had a peculiar power of their own. Lady Thetford, very, very pale, held out one fair jeweled hand. "Captain Everard, I am very glad to see you again." He bent over the little hand a moment, then dropped it, and stood looking at her silent. "I thought you were in India," she said, trying to be at ease. "When did you return?" "A month ago. My wife is dead. I, too, am widowed, Lady Thetford." "I am very sorry to hear it," she said, gravely. "Did she die in India?" "Yes; and I have come home with my little daughter." "Your daughter! Then she left a child?" "One. It is on her account I have come. The climate killed her mother. I had mercy on her daughter, and have brought her home." "I am sorry for your wife. Why did she remain in India?" "Because she preferred death to leaving me. She loved me, Lady Thetford!" His powerful eyes were on her face--that pale, beautiful face, into which the blood came for an instant at his words. She looked at him, then away over the darkening sea. "And you, my lady--you gained the desire to your heart, wealth, and a title? Let me hope they have made you a happy woman." "I am not happy!" "No? But you have been--you were while Sir Noel lived?" "My husband was very good to me, Captain Everard. His death was the greatest misfortune that could have befallen me." "But you are young, you are free, you are rich, you are beautiful. You may wear a coronet next time."