“I expect they know a good deal more now,” said Margaret, laughing. “The news that you are the Honourable Elinor Leyton and that your father is Baron Walthamstowe, was known all over Heyst the second day we were here. And I have no doubt it has been succeeded by the interesting intelligence that you are engaged to marry Captain Pullen. You cannot keep servants’ tongues from wagging, you know!” “I suppose not!” replied Elinor, with a _moue_ of contempt. “However, they will learn no more through me or Ralph. We are not ‘’Arry and ’Arriet’ to sit on the Digue with our arms round each other’s waists.” “Still--there are signs and symptoms,” said Margaret, laughing. “There will be none with us!” rejoined Miss Leyton, indignantly, as Harriet Brandt, with a black lace hat on, trimmed with yellow roses, and a little fichu tied carelessly across her bosom, ran lightly down the steps to join them. CHAPTER II. The Digue was crowded by that time. All Heyst had turned out to enjoy the evening air and to partake in the gaiety of the place. A band was playing on the movable orchestra, which was towed by three skinny little donkeys, day after day, from one end of the Digue to the other. To-night, it was its turn to be in the middle, where a large company of people was sitting on green painted chairs that cost ten centimes for hire each, whilst children danced, or ran madly round and round its base. Everyone had changed his, or her, seaside garb for more fashionable array--even the children were robed in white frocks and gala hats--and the whole scene was gay and festive. Harriet Brandt ran from one side to the other of the Digue, as though she also had been a child. Everything she saw seemed to astonish and delight her. First, she was gazing out over the calm and placid water--and next, she was exclaiming at the bits of rubbish in the shape of embroidered baskets, or painted shells, exhibited in the shop windows, which were side by side with the private houses and hotels, forming a long line of buildings fronting the water. She kept on declaring that she wanted to buy that or this, and lamenting she had not brought more money with her. “You will have plenty of opportunities to select and purchase what you want to-morrow,” said Mrs. Pullen, “and you will be better able to judge what they are like. They look better under the gas than they do by daylight, I can assure you, Miss Brandt!” “O! but they are lovely--delightful!” replied the girl, enthusiastically, “I never saw anything so pretty before! Do look at that little doll in a bathing costume, with her cap in one hand, her sponge in the other! She is charming--unique! _Tout ce qu’il y a de plus beau!_” She spoke French perfectly, and when she spoke English, it was with a slightly foreign accent, that greatly enhanced its charm. It made Mrs. Pullen observe: “You are more used to speaking French than English, Miss Brandt!”