"I wanted to come and tell you that I was sorry," she continued softly, "and I wanted, too, to remind you that you are still young, and that the loss of a fortune is not the most terrible thing in the world. I heard yesterday that you were out upon Salthouse Neck, close to the quicksands. You know it is never safe there, with these winter tides. Life is not a thing to be trifled with. It may seem terrible to you just now to have lost your great fortune, to be once more a poor man. These things, after all, don't count for much against the gift of life. I know it sounds like humbug to hear me talk like this, but they were gossiping about you in the village. One man was saying that he shouldn't be at all surprised to hear that you had disappeared, and to find--to find--" she added, with a little shiver, "your body come up the creek with the next tide. You wouldn't do anything like that, would you?" "Not a ghost of a chance of it," he answered cheerily. "Besides, I am not quite a pauper yet." "You have lost the case, haven't you?" she asked quickly. "They seemed to think so in the village, and I heard that Mr. Sarsby said his niece had come into a million pounds." "Up till last night, at any rate," answered Deane, "nothing was decided. The judge reserved his decision." "Then why," she asked wonderingly, "did you come down here?" He drew her a little closer to him, and looked into her eyes. "I think, dear," he said, "that it was Providence which sent me." * * * * * They walked along the sands, and for them the sun shone still, and the song of the lark was only the faint echo of a still more wonderful music. And then, as they turned back, they saw along the dyke a boy riding a bicycle, a boy with a leather satchel around his waist, and the rim of whose bicycle was red. He pressed her arm. "Courage, dear," he said. "This is the Mercury who brings us the knowledge of our fate. In a few moments you will know whether you are to become the wife of a millionaire or a working man." "If you would only believe," she murmured, "how little it matters!" "I do believe," he answered. "I came down here, for one reason, to escape the shock of hearing the news before others. Now that it comes, I simply do not mind. There are greater things in the world than the Little Anna Gold-Mine!" He took the telegram from the boy, and opened it with firm fingers. He read it out aloud without a tremor: Counsel met in judge's private room by appointment to-day. Have compromised with plaintiffs twenty thousand pounds. Deane threw a coin to the boy, who remounted his bicycle and rode away. Then, turning to Winifred, "You see," he said, "you have brought me luck." "I only pray," she murmured, as they turned together toward the tower, "that I may bring you happiness!" * * * * *