Now, what was that?  About twenty paces beneath him, on the seaward side of the dune, he caught a glimpse of another golden object, an unusual object, the nature of which he did not at once identify.  He shaded his eyes with his hand, and presently began to laugh softly.  That golden thing which had caught his eye was the uncovered head of a girl.  She was seated in a hollow of the hill, and the tall star-grass and blossoming ragwort grew so freely at this spot that only her head was visible.  All at once a hand was thrust out from behind the screen, and a sudden shower of gold fell downwards from that glittering crown.  John laughed again as the girl began very composedly to comb her hair.

He came down the hill, stepping as lightly as he could, and paused in front of her quaint ’tiring-room.  She looked up as his shadow fell across her, paused a moment with the comb poised in mid-air, and then calmly drew it through her yellow locks.  What hair it was!  It fell round her like a veil as she sat:  it would reach almost to her knees, John thought, if she were standing.  He looked at her with a kind of awe; for a moment the strange tales he had so often heard of mermaids and witches recurring to his mind.  But he was reassured on a closer inspection of the girl and her attire.  She wore a bed-gown and apron like Jinny’s, but not, alas! so neat or clean; her stuff petticoat, too, was ragged and old, and the feet, which were stretched forth from under its folds, were brown and bare as the hands which so deftly wielded the comb.

John’s eyes rested with intense disapproval on these shapely feet, and travelled slowly backwards over the ragged petticoat and the pink cotton jacket—­which, instead of being neatly buttoned over at the neck, fell loosely open, disclosing the girl’s throat, firm and round as a pillar—­and so on till they reached her face; then suddenly drooped before the disconcerting gaze of another pair of eyes, very large and bright.

“I hope ye’ll know me again,” said the girl.

John looked up with a grin.  “It’ll be hard work if you keep your face covered up with all that hair,” he said.

She gathered together the heavy yellow masses with both hands, twisted them up with astonishing speed and deftness, and let her arms fall upon her lap.

“Theer!” she said.

It was not a pretty face John at first decided; tanned as it was to the colour of ripe corn, and the eyes, such a light blue and with such blue whites, looking so strange in this setting.  The cheeks, moreover, were not rosy like those of his cousin Jinny, nor rounded in their contours—­the chin was too pointed; yet even as John looked a sudden dimple flashed there, and a smile, swift and mischievous, lit up the whole face.  Then he did not feel quite so sure.

[Illustration:  Golden sally “I hope ye’ll know me again,” said the girl]

“What in the name of fortune are you doing here?” he asked abruptly, almost roughly, for the smile nettled him.  “Can’t you find some better place than this to do your dressing in?”