“I had an idea,” Hamel said quietly, “that St. David’s Tower was going to spoil the landscape for a good many years. My property, you know, and there’s the end of it. I am sick of seeing people for the last few days come down and take photographs of it for every little rag that goes to press.”
Mr. Dunster pointed out to the line of surf beyond. “If only some hand,” he remarked, “could plant dynamite below that streak of white, so that the sea could disgorge its dead! They tell me there’s a Spanish galleon there, and a Dutch warship, besides a score or more of fishing-boats.”
Mrs. Fentolin shivered a little. She drew her cloak around her. Gerald, who had been watching her, sprang to his feet.
“Come,” he exclaimed, “we chose the gardens for our last afternoon here, to be out of the way of these places! We’ll go round the hill.”
Mrs. Fentolin shook her head once more. Her face had recovered its serenity. She looked downward gravely but with no sign of fear.
“There is nothing to terrify us there, Gerald,” she declared. “The sea has gathered, and the sea will hold its own.”
Hamel held out his hand to Esther.
“I have destroyed the only house in the world which I possess,” he said. “Come and look for violets with me in the spinney, and let us talk of the houses we are going to build, and the dreams we shall dream in them.”