“Why do you dislike the sea?” I repeated.  “You must have a reason.”

“I think,” she replied, “it makes me melancholy and low spirited.”

“Well it might!” I thought, for the rush and fall of the waves must be like a vast requiem to her.

“That is not the effect the sea has upon most people,” I said.

“No, I suppose not; it has upon me,” she answered.  Then smiling at me as she went on:  “You seem to think it is my fault, Mr. Ford, that I do not love the sea.”

“It is your misfortune,” I replied, and our eyes met.

I meant nothing by the words, but a shifting, curious look came into her face, and for the first time since I had been there her eyes fell before mine.

“I suppose it is,” she said, quietly; but from the moment we were never quite the same again.  She watched me curiously, and I knew it.

“Like or dislike, Frances, give way this time,” said Lance, “and John will go with us.”

“Do you really wish it?” she asked.

“I should like it; I think it would do us all good.  And, after all, yours is but a fancy, Frances.”

“If we go at all,” she said, “let us go to the great Northern sea, not to the South, where it is smiling and treacherous.”

“Those southern seas hide much,” I said; and again she looked at me with a curious, intent gaze—­a far-off gaze, as though she were trying to make something out.

“What do they hide, John?” asked Lance, indifferently.

“Sharp rocks and shifting sands,” I answered.

“So do the Northern seas,” he replied.

A soft, sweet voice said:  “Every one has his own taste.  I love the country; you love the sea.  I find more beauty in this bunch of lilac than I should in all the seaweed that was ever thrown on the beach; to me there is more poetry and more loveliness in the ripple of the leaves, the changeful hues of the trees and flowers, the corn in the fields, the fruit in the orchards, than in the perpetual monotony of the sea.”

“That is not fair, Frances,” cried Lance.  “Say what you will, but never call the sea monotonous—­it is never that; it always gives on the impression of power and majesty.”

“And of mystery,” I interrupted.

“Of mystery,” she repeated, and the words seemed forced from her in spite of herself.

“Yes, of mystery!” I said.  “Think what is buried in the sea!  Think of the vessels that have sank laden with human beings!  No one will know one-third of the mysteries of the sea until the day when she gives up the dead.”

The spray of lilac fell to the ground.  She rose quickly and made no attempt to regain it.

“It is growing chilly,” she said; “I will go into the house.”

“A strange thing that my wife does not like the sea,” said Lance.

But it was not strange to my mind—­not strange at all.

CHAPTER VIII.