"We must go and see the sunset to-night from our cliff," said Walter. "Mamma, will you go?"
"I should very much like it; but I know I shall be too tired with packing."
"You will go with us, I hope?" said Walter, turning to Christina.
"Oh, certainly! I should be very sorry to miss it; and we shall have a beautiful sunset, I believe, by the look of the day."
"Then we will all come," said Nellie; "and mamma will allow Netta and Isabel for once."
"Very well," said mamma, "if they are not sleepy."
The afternoon was spent by all in busy packing—a very different affair from the coming packing; for this time there was only, as Arthur said, "to stuff in all their possessions." Everything must go home. The rooms looked very empty and forlorn by tea-time; and the young people professed to be very tired, "but not too tired to go out; oh, dear, no!"
When they arrived at the piece of breezy cliff which jutted out into the sea, and looked round, it appeared to them all that on this last evening the ocean seemed more blue, more lovely than usual. Arthur was looking at it a little discontentedly; Ada was thinking how much had happened since she had come there, and with what a changed and thankful heart she would go home; Nellie felt her sorrow revived as she gazed on the boundless expanse; and Christina was thinking deeply and lovingly of her plans. And Walter? Where were his thoughts?
"Shall we sing?" he said presently.
They all assented heartily, and sang over some of the hymns which had become so very familiar during the last month. Then the conversation fell naturally into the discussion of some of Christina's projects, and she told them of a talk she had had with Mrs. Ross about Alfy, and how she had obtained a willing consent to let him go to her, promising that he should come down to see his grandparents every now and then.