As I said, I took two codein pills instead of one that night, and in an hour or so was conscious of the comfort and phantasmagoria of morphia. I was no longer in the bedroom of which I had tired, nor in the rough garden without trees or shade. I had escaped from these and in returning health was beside the sea, happily listening to the little waves breaking on the stones, no soul in sight but those two, Margaret Capel and Gabriel Stanton, in earnest talk that came to me as I sat with my back against a rock, the salt wind in my face. How it was they did not see me and moderate their voices I do not know, morphia gives one these little lapses and surprises. Margaret looked extraordinarily sedate and yet perverse, her thin lips pink and eyes dancing. I saw the incandescent effect of which Peter Kennedy had told me. It was not only her eyes that were alight but the woman herself, the luminous fair skin and the fairness of her hair stirred and brightened by the sun and the sea-wind. She talked vividly, whilst he sat at her feet listening intently, offering her the homage of his softened angularities, his abandoned scholarship, his adoring eyes. “Why did you come? I told you not to come. Of course I meant to wire in answer to your letter that you were to stay in London. What was the use of my running away?” I saw that he fingered the hem of her skirt, and watched her all the time she spoke. “Tomorrow I shall have no expectation in the post. I hate not to care whether my letters come or not. And Monday too. You have spoiled two mornings for me.” “I am not as satisfying as my letters to you.” Even his voice was changed, the musical charming Stanton voice. His had deepened and there was the note of an organ in it. She looked at him critically or caressingly. “Not quite, not yet. I understand your letters better than I do you. And you are never twice alike, not quite alike. We part as friends, intimates. Then we come together again and you are almost a stranger; we have to begin all over again.” “I am sorry.” He looked perplexed. “How do I change or vary? I cannot bear to think that you should look upon me as a stranger.” “Only for a few moments.” “When you met me at the station today?” “I was at the station early, and then was vexed I had come, looking about me to see if there were any one I knew or who knew me. I took refuge at the bookstall, found ‘The Immoralists’ among the two-shilling soiled.” She left off abruptly, and her face clouded. “Don’t!” he whispered. “How quick you are!” Now their hands met. She smiled and went on talking. “I heard a click and saw that the signals were down. The train rounded the curve and came in slowly. People descended; I was conscious of half a dozen, although I saw but one. No, I didn’t see you, only your covert coat and felt hat. I felt a pang of disappointment.” Their hands fell apart. I saw he was hurt. She may have seen it too, but made no sign.