Pale and trembling he stood on the beach and looked at the rocks where Margaret had been seen—looked until his eyes grew dim, then he crawled back to the cottage.
"You have been to Appleford?" said Austin, who had watched him.
Blair lifted his heavy eyes.
"Yes, I have been to Appleford," he said in a hollow voice. "I have seen the last——" he stopped, and his breath came and went in quick gasps. "Austin, while I live, my poor darling will be with me in my thoughts but—but never speak her name to me. Never! I—I could not bear it."
"Yes!" murmured Austin Ambrose, sympathetically. "I understand. You will fight your sorrow like a man Blair. Time—Time, the great healer—will close over even so great a wound as yours, and you will be able to speak of her, poor girl."
Blair looked before him with lack-luster eyes.
"Do you think that a man who had been thrust out of Heaven could ever learn to forget the happiness he had lost?" he said, in a low voice. "While life lasts I shall remember her, shall long to go to her! That is enough," he added sternly; "we will never speak of her again!"
[CHAPTER XX.]
What passed in the cabin of the Rose of Devon between the two women, Mrs. Day never told, not even to her husband.