In the evenings Betty read or knitted and inveigled her stout, kindly landlady into gossip on the threshold while she cleared away the evening meal, and so the morning of the ninth day found Betty staring out of her window, listening for the thrush to begin again its haunting, unfinished song. An object moving rapidly along the top of the hedge that skirted the lane leading to the cottage caught her eye; she watched it until the hedge terminated, when it resolved itself into the top of Eileen Cavendish's hat. Her pretty face was pink with exertion and excitement, and she moved at a gait suggestive of both running and walking. Betty greeted her at the gateway of her little garden, and her heart quickened as she ran to meet the bearer of tidings. "My dear," gasped Mrs. Cavendish, "they're coming in this morning. Mrs. Monro--that's my landlady--has a brother in the town: I forget what he does there, but he always knows." For an instant the colour ebbed from Betty's cheeks, and then her beating heart sent it surging back again. "But----" she said. "Does that mean that our squadron is coming in?" "Of course it does, silly! Get your hat quick, and we'll climb up to the top of the hill and see if we can get a glimpse of them coming in. You'll have plenty of time to get down again and powder your nose before your Bunje-man, or whatever you call him, can get ashore. Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!" Together they toiled up the hill to the high stretch of moorland from which a view of the entrance to the Firth could be obtained. "This is where I always come," said Eileen Cavendish. She stopped and panted for breath. "Ouf! I'm getting fat and short-winded. How long is it since you've seen your husband?" Betty considered. "Three months and seventeen days," was the reply. Her companion nodded. "It's rotten, isn't it? But now--at times like this, I almost feel as if it's--worth it, I was going to say; but I suppose it's hardly that. I always vowed I'd never marry a sailor, and ever since I did I've felt sorry for all the women with other kinds of husbands.... Bill is such a dear!" They found seats in the lee of a stack of peat and sat down side by side to watch the distant entrance. A faint grey haze beyond the headlands on either side of the mouth of the harbour held the outer sea in mystery. "There's nothing in sight," said Betty. "No," said the other, "but there will be, presently. You wait." She put her elbows on her knees and rested her face in the cup of her two hands. "You haven't got used to waiting yet," she continued. "It seems to have made up half my life since I met Bill. I had a little daughter once, and it didn't matter so much then.... But she died, the mite..." No Battleships had emerged from the blue-grey curtain of the mist when lunch-time came; nothing moved across the surface of the empty harbour, and they descended the hill to share the meal in Betty's room.