The sun, sinking toward the plum-colored hills on the left, cast a rosy glow over low-piled clouds at the far horizon, and the water of the harbor seemed scattered with the petals of crimson peonies. The air darkened perceptibly. For a moment the grey town on the fading water, the distant flushed sky, were charged with the vague unrest of the flickering day. Suddenly it was colder, and Honora, drawing up her shawl, sharply commanded Coggs to drive on. She was going to fetch Paret Fifield from the steam railway station nearest Cottarsport. He visited her at regular intervals--although the usual period had been doubled since she'd seen him--and asked her with unfailing formality to be his wife. Why she hadn't agreed long ago, except that Paret was Boston personified, she did not understand. In the moments when she fled to the city she always intended to have him come to her at once. But hardly had she arrived before her determination would waver, and her thoughts automatically, against her will, return to Cottarsport. Studying him, as they drove back through the early dusk, she was surprised that he had been so long-suffering. He was not a patient type of man; rather he was the quietly aggressive, suavely selfish example for whom the world, success, had been a very simple matter. He was not solemn, either, or a recluse, as faithful lovers commonly were; but furnished a leading figure in the cotillions and had a nice capacity for wine. She said almost complainingly: “How young and gay you look, Paret, with your lemon verbena.” He was, it seemed to her, not entirely at ease, and almost confused at her statement. Nevertheless, he gave his person a swiftly complacent glance. “I do seem quite well,” he agreed surprisingly. “Honora, I'm the next thing to fifty. Would any one guess it?” This was a new aspect of Paret's, and she studied him keenly, with the slightly satirical mouth inherited from her father. Embarrassment became evident at his exhibition of trivial pride, and nothing more was said until, winding through the gloom of Cottarsport, they had reached her house. Inside there was a wide hall with the stair mounting on the right under a panelled arch. Mrs. Coz-zens, Honora's aunt and companion, was in the drawing room when they entered, and greeted Paret Fifield with the simple friendliness which, clearly without disagreeable intent, she reserved for an unquestionable few. After dinner, the elder woman winding wool from an ivory swift clamped to a table, Honora thought that Paret had never been so vivacious; positively he was silly. For no comprehensible reason her mind turned to Jason Burrage, striding with a lowered head, in his incongruous clothes, through the town of his birth.