to him when he shewed himself near the cottage,—­still there was a deep dread upon her when her eyes rested upon him, when her thoughts flew to him.  Men are wolves to women, and utterly merciless when feeding high their lust.  ’Twas thus her own thoughts shaped themselves, though she never uttered a syllable to her daughter in disparagement of the man.  This was the girl’s chance.  Was she to rob her of it?  And yet, of all her duties, was not the duty of protecting her girl the highest and the dearest that she owned?  If the man meant well by her girl, she would wash his feet with her hair, kiss the hem of his garments, and love the spot on which she had first seen him stand like a young sea-god.  But if evil,—­if he meant evil to her girl, if he should do evil to her Kate,—­then she knew that there was so much of the tiger within her bosom as would serve to rend him limb from limb.  With such thoughts as these she had hardly ever left them together.  Nor had such leaving together seemed to be desired by them.  As for Kate she certainly would have shunned it.  She thought of Fred Neville during all her waking moments, and dreamed of him at night.  His coming had certainly been to her as the coming of a god.  Though he did not appear on the cliffs above once or twice a week, and had done so but for a few weeks, his presence had altered the whole tenour of her life.  She never asked her mother now whether it was to be always like this.  There was a freshness about her life which her mother understood at once.  She was full of play, reading less than was her wont, but still with no sense of tedium.  Of the man in his absence she spoke but seldom, and when his name was on her lips she would jest with it,—­as though the coming of a young embryo lord to shoot gulls on their coast was quite a joke.  The seal-skin which he had given her was very dear to her, and she was at no pains to hide her liking; but of the man as a lover she had never seemed to think.

Nor did she think of him as a lover.  It is not by such thinking that love grows.  Nor did she ever tell herself that while he was there, coming on one day and telling them that his boat would be again there on another, life was blessed to her, and that, therefore, when he should have left them, her life would be accursed to her.  She knew nothing of all this.  But yet she thought of him, and dreamed of him, and her young head was full of little plans with every one of which he was connected.

And it may almost be said that Fred Neville was as innocent in the matter as was the girl.  It is true, indeed, that men are merciless as wolves to women,—­that they become so, taught by circumstances and trained by years; but the young man who begins by meaning to be a wolf must be bad indeed.  Fred Neville had no such meaning.  On his behalf it must be acknowledged that he had no meaning whatever when he came again and again to Ardkill.  Had he examined himself in the matter he would have declared