Diana awoke with a start.  Before sleep had overtaken her she had been lying on a shallow slope of sand, leaning against a rock, with her elbow resting on its flat surface and her book propped up in front of her.  Gradually the rhythmic rise and fall of the waves on the shore had lulled her into slumber—­the plop as they broke in eddies of creaming foam, and then the sibilant hush-sh-sh—­like a long-drawn sigh—­as the water receded only to gather itself afresh into a crested billow.

Scarcely more than half awake she sat up and stared about her, dreamily wondering how she came to be there.  She felt very stiff, and the arm on which she had been leaning ached horribly.  She rubbed it a little, dully conscious of the pain, and as the blood began to course through the veins again, the sharp, pricking sensation commonly known as “pins and needles” aroused her effectually, and she recollected that she had walked out to Culver Point and established herself in one of the numerous little bays that fringed the foot of the great red cliff, intending to spend a pleasant afternoon in company with a new novel.  And then the Dustman (idling about until his duties proper should commence in the evening) had come by and touched her eyelids and she had fallen fast asleep.

But she was thoroughly wide awake now, and she looked round her with a rather startled expression, realising that she must have slept for some considerable time, for the sun, which had been high in the heavens, had already dipped towards the horizon and was shedding a rosy track of light across the surface of the water.  The tide, too, had come up a long way since she had dozed off into slumber, and waves were now breaking only a few yards distant from her feet.

She cast a hasty glance to right and left, where the arms of the little cove stretched out to meet the sea, strewn with big boulders clothed in shell and seaweed.  But there were no rocks to be seen.  The grey water was lapping lazily against the surface of the cliff itself and she was cut off on either side.

For a minute or so her heart beat unpleasantly fast; then, with a quick sense of relief, she recollected that only at spring tides was the little bay where she stood entirely under water.  There was no danger, she reflected, but nevertheless her position was decidedly unenviable.  It was not yet high tide, so it would be some hours at least before she would be able to make her way home, and meanwhile the sun was sinking fast, it was growing unpleasantly cold, and she was decidedly hungry.  In the course of another hour or two she would probably be hungrier still, but with no nearer prospect of dinner, while the Rector and Joan would be consumed with anxiety as to what had become of her.

Anxiously she scanned the sea, hoping she might sight some homing fishing-boat which she could hail, but no welcome red or brown sail broke the monotonous grey waste of water, and in hopes of warming herself a little she began to walk briskly up and down the little beach still keeping a sharp look-out at sea for any passing boat.