His gaze, that had fallen, and was resting on the hem of her blue serge gown, now traveled up the long, slender line of her limbs, past the dim curves of her body to the wonder of her face. How marvelously changed she was! She was not only both younger and older than when he had left her five years ago, she was another woman. The heaviness had gone from her eyes and forehead, the bitter, determined, self-restraint from her mouth and chin; instead of self-restraint she had acquired that rarer virtue, self-possession. Her lips had softened, had blossomed into the sweet red flower that was part of Nature's original design. Her face had grown plastic to her feeling and her thought. She was ripened and freshened by sun and wind, by salt water and salt air; a certain nameless, intangible grace that he had caught once, twice, long ago, and seen no more, was now her abiding charm. The haggard, sallow-faced provincial, with her inscrutable manners and tumultuous heart, had developed into the finished cosmopolitan; she had about her the glory and bloom of the world. For once his artist's instinct had failed him; he had not discovered the promise of her physical beauty--but that he should have ignored the finer possibilities of her soul! If she had really known all that he had thought and felt about her then, had understood and had yet forgiven him, Frida was unlike any other woman in the world. He was not sure that this was not the secret of her charm--the marvelous dexterity of her sympathy, the swiftness with which she precipitated herself into his point of view. It had its drawbacks; it meant that she could see another man's and her own with equal clearness. The sound of voices from a neighboring cabin, followed by the noise of unskillful footsteps stumbling up a companion ladder, warned them that they were not alone. Mr. Manby appeared on deck with great noise and circumstance, skating, struggling, clutching at impossible supports, being much hampered by a camp stool and a sketching block which he carried, and his own legs, which seemed hardly equal to carrying him. Durant had recognized in the little artist a familiar type. A small, nervous man, attired in the usual threadbare gray trousers, the usual seedy velveteen coat and slouch hat, with a great deal of grizzled hair tumbling in the usual disorder about his peaked and peevish face. Durant sprang forward and helped this pitiful figure to find its legs; not with purely benevolent intentions, he settled it and its belongings in a secure (and remote) position amidships. "Glad to see you back again!" Frida sang out. Mr. Manby screwed up his eyes, put his head very much on one side, and peered into the wild face of Nature with a pale, propitiatory smile. "Yes, yes; I mustn't neglect my opportunities. Every minute of this weather is invaluable."