Bess giggled; and the Colonel adjusted his field-glasses with delicate precision.
"If you say it's going to rain and keep on saying it long enough you'll probably prove right in the end," he remarked. "It's dogged as does it in the realm of speculation as elsewhere in my experience."
The old surgeon and his daughter turned their backs on the flagstaff and the solitary watchman beside it, and jogged towards the sunset red-strewn behind the white bluff of the Seven Sisters Newhaven-way.
Two figures topped the brow of Warren Hill in front and came swiftly over the short turf towards them. It was Saturday: Ruth and Ernie were on their way to their secret covert above Cow Gap as usual.
"About your last week-end up here before the weather breaks, I should say," chaffed the old surgeon as he passed them.
Ernie laughed a little nervously.
"Yes, sir. Just what I were a-sayin to Ruth," he answered. He had thought his secret known to none.
"Well, I hope the police won't catch you," remarked the other with a grin as he rode on.
"Never!—not unless someone was to give us away, sir!" said Ruth demurely, as she looked across the sea under lowered brows.
Bess called back reassuringly over her shoulder: