It was not the way Caroline had designed the set and she said so. She said clearly and rather complainingly that she had expected to play with Durland, and yet she did not seem wounded so much as thwarted. "I'm sure I don't know whom I can get," she said. "I suppose you can get the faithful Wally--anyone can get Wally." "I thought you did not like Wally." "I?" said Durland, as if it were far beneath him ever to have been aware of Wally's existence; and without any further answer he got up and walked into the Atlantic so suddenly that Miss Temple, scrambling as rapidly as possible to her feet, was several yards behind him as he dived into his first wave. "Isn't she pretty?" said Antonia. "She's been his best girl for two summers." "I don't think he's very nice to her," said Pearl. "Well," said Antonia, giving one of her little shakes of the head, "it would seem wonderful to me if Durlie spoke to me at all. However, it may be over. Like what Shakespeare says--one foot on land. Next time I have a chance I'll look and see if her picture is still in the back of his watch." Presently they were back in the same order--Durland first, and Miss Temple following. He sat dripping, and taking a cigarette from a package he had left on the sand, he began groping for a match. "Oh, Durland," said Miss Temple, "I do wish you wouldn't smoke. It isn't good for you. It looks so badly." Durland gave a short laugh that seemed to say that if he had regarded public opinion he would have made of life a very different thing. In her distress Caroline turned to the stranger whose presence she had so far refused to acknowledge. "Don't you think it's wrong for him to smoke?" she said. It was Pearl's moment. "Why, no," she answered, "I can't see anything wrong about it." She put out a lazy hand and took one from the little paper envelope. Durland's hand, with the match in it, was arrested. "But--you're not going to smoke--here? On the public beach?" "Isn't it allowed?" asked Pearl, all innocence. "It must be--you are smoking. Let me have a match." "I haven't a match," he said, and threw away his own cigarette so that she could not get a light from that. It was an important moment in his life. He thought rapidly. "I hope you won't think me fresh or anything," he said, "but I don't think a governess ought to smoke, if you know what I mean--not in public anyhow." She wasn't angry, only thoughtful. "Well, that's only your opinion." It touched him that she knew so little of the world--or of her own position. He said gently, "I'm afraid you'd find it was everybody's opinion." "Ought you to be so much influenced by the opinion of other people?" "Yes, indeed," he answered. The cigarette with which she was still playing might separate them forever. His mother, he knew, was just waiting for a good excuse to send her away, and where could she find a better one?