in her life who had first claim upon her heart.  That would be her other chance.  And should Roger—­as well he might—­refuse to take second best, then willy-nilly she would be once more thrust forth into the troublous sea of longing and desire.  But if he still wanted her—­why, then she would have been quite honest with him and it would seem to be her destiny to be his wife.  She would leave it at that—­leave it for chance, or fate, or whatever it is that shapes our ends, to settle a matter that, swayed as she was by opposing forces, she was unable to decide for herself.

She heaved a sigh of relief.  After those wretched, interminable hours of irresolution, when love, and fear of that same love, had tortured her almost beyond bearing, it was an odd kind of comfort to feel that she had given herself two chances, and, if both failed, to know that she must abide by the result.

The turmoil of her mind drove her at last almost insensibly towards the low, wide wall facing the unquiet sea.  Here she sat down, still absorbed in her thoughts, her gaze resting absently on the incoming tide below.  She was conscious of a strange feeling of communion with the shifting, changeful waters.

As far as eye could see the great billows of the Atlantic, silver-crested in the brilliant moonlight, came tumbling shoreward, breaking at last against the inviolate cliffs with a dull, booming noise like the sound of distant guns.  Then came the suction of retreat, as the beaten waves were hurled backwards from the fierce headlands in a grey tumult of surging waters, while the big stones and pebbles over which they swirled clashed and ground together, roaring under the pull of the outgoing current—­that “drag” of which any Cornish seaman will warn a stranger in the grave tones of one who knows its peril.

To right and left, at the foot of savage cliffs black against the silver moonlight, Nan could see the long combers roll in and break into a cloud of upflung spray, girdling the wild coast with a zone of misty, moonlit spray that must surely have been fashioned in some dim world of faery.

She sat very still, watching the eternal battle between sea and shore, and the sheer splendour of it laid hold of her, so that for a little while everything that troubled her was swept away.  For the moment she felt absolutely happy.

Always the vision, of anything overwhelmingly beautiful seemed to fill her soul, drawing with it the memories of all that had been beautiful in life.  And watching this glory of moon and sea and shore, Nan felt strangely comforted.  Maryon Rooke had no part in it, nor Roger Trenby.  But her love for Peter and his for her seemed one and indivisible with it.  That, and music—­the two most beautiful things which had entered into her life.

. . .  A bank of cloud, slowly spreading upward from the horizon, suddenly clothed the moon in darkness, wiping out the whole landscape.  Only the ominous boom of the waves and the roar of the struggling beach still beat against Nan’s ears.