Towards evening uneasiness sprang up again, with the old question--would he return? She told herself that if he did, she would not hold back, she would not let her inexperience and timidity rob her or him of their love. She would let him kiss her as he pleased--love was too good a thing to risk for a few qualms. But would he come?--would he give her the chance of reparation? The sun dipped behind Castweasel, the hot sky cooled into a limpid green--stars specked it in the north, and the moon came up behind Iden Woods, huge and dim. Caro ran out once or twice into the garden; the flowers hung pale and stirless on their stems, and from the orchard, full of the babble of a hidden wind, came a faint scent of plums. The old walls of Odiam seemed to smell of the sunshine they had caught and held during the day. The gable-ends broke into the stars, and the windows gleamed in the yellowing light of the moon. Up towards the south the mass of Boarzell rose hullish and deserted--far away at Ellenwhorne a dog was barking, but all else was still. § 5. There was no doubt that Joe Dansay had got drunk at Willie Tailleur's wedding. The fact was cruelly emphasised by the headache with which he woke up the next morning. He thought it very hard luck, for after all, he had not got nearly so drunk as he might have, as he often had. However, he had been forced into abstinence by a long voyage from Sierra Leone, and put down his sufferings to nature's mutiny at such an unwholesome state of affairs. At present he lodged with some relations in Watchbell Street, and round him were all the Dansays and Tailleurs and Espinettes and Perrots, the Rye fisher tribe, of French origin--which was still traceable in their names, in their brown eyes, and the sensitiveness of their mouths. He nearly always went to his people between voyages, for the Rye girls took his fancy. There was at this moment a charmer in Wish Ward on whom a good part of his pay had already been spent. Sometimes he went out in his uncle Bob Dansay's fishing boat, for he was not above handling a net between his ventures on the high seas. He mumbled curses as he dressed, and bathed his head in cold water. He did not deserve this visitation--usually he regarded an after-debauch headache as one of the marvellous acts of Providence, in which he, like most sailormen, believed with a faith which though conveniently removed from works was deeply tinged with admiration. But yesterday he had not been really drunk--why, he could remember nearly everything that had happened, the dancing, the songs, the girls, how he had walked home singing "Rio Bay," and how he had met that queer girl at the farmhouse gate, and thought he was going to have some fun with her and been disappointed.