Now the poor young fisherman was seized with an irresistible longing to look once more upon the face of her whom he had loved with the purest and most devoted affection, from the hour of their childhood when she found him on the beach and claimed him as her playmate until this hour, when, after a seven years’ absence, she was returning home. If he should not succeed in getting a glimpse of her now, he feared that he might never see her again, for his occupation on the promontory was gone, since the fishing landing had been replaced by a pier and a boat-house.
He took his fishing-rod and went down on the neck at low tide, to wait for her carriage to pass.
He sat on a high rock, and baited his hook for “sheep’s-head,” which most did congregate about that spot. But before he could cast his line into the sea, the sound of wheels was heard approaching. He looked up and saw the promontory carriage coming slowly down the gradual descent leading on to the neck. He drew his broad-brimmed straw hat low over his eyes, and his heart almost stood still as he muttered within himself:
“Will she recognize ‘David Lindsay?’ I should know her anywhere, or after any length of time.”
The carriage was coming. It was wide open, the top had been thrown quite down, both back and front, that the travelers might enjoy the fresh air and fine scenery of land and water on that delicious October afternoon.
On the coachman’s box sat Laban, lazily holding the reins. On the front seat, with his back to the negro, sat Colonel de Crespigney, with his traveling cap on his knees before him, leaving his fine head, with his waving black hair and beard and his Roman features, bare.
Opposite him, on the back seat, sat a very restless young lady, with the face of an eager, vivacious child—a face with a delicate Grecian profile, a dainty, rosebud complexion, sparkling, glad blue eyes, and rippling, golden-hued hair.
She was constantly springing from side to side, gazing now on the right, now on the left, to catch glimpses of distant objects, once familiar, but long unseen.
“Oh, uncle!” she gladly exclaimed. “I can see the tall trees on this side of the dee-ar old house!”
“Wait until you see the house, my darling!” he replied, conscious of the surprise he should give her when he should show her the gray old “penitentiary” transfigured to a white palace.