You see, I shouldn’t care to make the acquaintance of a gorgeous creature with black hair and a train of yellow satin half a mile long, who tosses up a gilt goblet when she sings a drinking-song, and then gets into a frightful passion about what one doesn’t understand.  Wouldn’t you rather meet the ‘Maid of Llangollen’ coming along a country road—­coming in by Marazion over there, for example—­with a bright print dress all smelling of lavender, and a basket of fresh eggs over her arm?  Well—­What was I saying?  Oh yes!, Don’t you think if you were away in the Adriatic, and sitting up on deck at night, you would make the people have a quiet cry when you sang ’Home, Sweet Home’?  The words are rather silly, aren’t they?  But they make you think such a lot if you hear them abroad.”

“And when are you going away?—­this year, Mr. Trelyon?” Wenna said, looking down.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said cheerfully:  he would have no question of his going away interfere with the happiness of the present moment.

At length, however, they had to bethink themselves of getting back, for the western skies were deepening in color and the evening air was growing chill.  They ran the small cutter back to her moorings:  then they put off in the small boat for the shore.  It was a beautiful, quiet evening.  Wenna, who had taken off her glove and was allowing her bare hand to drag through the rippling water, seemed to be lost in distant and idle fancies not altogether of a melancholy nature.

“Wenna,” her mother said, “you will get your hand perfectly chilled.”

The girl drew back her hand and shook the water off her dripping fingers.  Then she uttered a slight cry.  “My ring!” she said, looking with absolute fright at her hand and then at the sea.

Of course they stopped the boat instantly, but all they could do was to stare at the clear, dark water.  The distress of the girl was beyond expression.  This was no ordinary trinket that had been lost:  it was a gage of plighted affection given her by one now far away, and in his absence she had carelessly flung it into the sea.  She had no fear of omens, as her sister had, but surely, of all things in the world, she ought to have treasured up this ring.  In spite of herself, tears sprang to her eyes.  Her mother in vain attempted to make light of the loss.

And then at last Harry Trelyon, driven almost beside himself by seeing the girl so plunged in grief, hit upon a wild fashion of consoling her.  “Wenna,” he said, “don’t disturb yourself.  Why, we can easily get you the ring.  Look at the rocks there:  a long bank of smooth sand slopes out from them, and your ring is quietly lying on the sand.  There is nothing easier than to get it up with a dredging machine:  I will undertake to let you have it by to-morrow afternoon.”

Mrs. Rosewarne thought he was joking, but he effectually persuaded Wenna, at all events, that she should have her ring next day.  Then he discovered that he would be just in time to catch the half-past six train to Plymouth, where he would get the proper apparatus, and return in the morning.