“I stooped down to see if the figure I sought was outlined on the rim of sky that brightened at the sea’s edge:  it was not there, not seaward.  I tried to call:  the air refused the weight of my voice; it went no farther than the lips, out of which it quivered and fell:  I could not call.  I took the dark tide-mark for my guide, and began searching landward.  I went a little way, then stopped to look and listen:  no sight, no sound.  The long sedge-grass gave rustling sighs of motion, as I passed near, and disturbed the air for a moment.  A night-bird uttered its cry out of the tall reeds.  The moon went down.  The tide began to come in; with it came up the wind.  The memory of Alice, of Mary, walked with and did not leave me, until I gained the little cove wherein Mary’s boat lay secure.  The tide had not reached it.  Mary’s boat!  I remember thinking—­a mere drop of thought it was, as I hurried on, but it held all the animalcules of emotion that round out a lifetime—­that Mary never more would come to unloose the bound boat, never more in it go forth to meet the joys that wander in from unknown shores.  I saw the boat lying dark along the water’s edge.  ‘I would run down a moment,’ I thought, ’run down to speak a word of comfort, as if it were a living thing.’

“Mary’s boat was not alone; it had a companion.  I thought it was Bernard.  I drew near and spoke his name.  Doctor Percival answered me.  I do not think that he recognized my voice.  He turned around with a startled movement, for I was quite close, and asked, ‘Who is it?’

“I did not answer.  I turned and fled away into the darkness, across the sands, that answer no footsteps with echoes.  It was a comfort to feel that he was out there, between me and the boundless space of sea.

“When I draw near the confines of Hereafter’s shore, I think I shall feel the same kind of comfort, if some soul that I knew has gone out just before me; it will cape the boundary-line of ‘all-aloneness.’”

Miss Axtell must have forgotten that she was talking to me, as she retraced her steps and thoughts of that night, for, with this thought, she seemed to “wander out into silence.”

Katie brought her back by coming up to say that “Mr. Abraham was waiting to know if she would go out a little while, it was so fine.”

Miss Axtell said that “she would not go,—­she would wait.”

Katie went to carry the message.  Miss Axtell wandered a little.  Between her words and memories I picked up the thread for her, and she went on before me.

“I took the direction of the village-pier, when I fled from Doctor Percival.  An unusual number of boats had come in.  I heard noises amid the shipping.  At any other time I should have avoided the place.  Now I drew near.

“Two men were slowly walking down the way.  I heard one of them ask, ’Do you know who it is?’

“The other replied, ’No, I never saw him before; we had better watch him; he went on in a desperate way.  I’ve seen it before, and it ended in’——­