"I should like it torn up—very small."
She took the envelope and hesitated. Durant was watching her. There was unmistakable mastery in his eyes.
"Go on!" he said briefly.
And with a quick, startled movement, she obeyed. The letter fluttered around them both in tiny fragments. Hugh Durant looked on with a hard, impassive face, as he might have looked on at an execution.
The girl's hands were shaking. She glanced at him once or twice uncertainly.
When the work of destruction was accomplished she made him a nervous curtsey and turned to go.
Durant's face softened a second time into a smile.
"Thank you—Molly," he said, and he put his hand to his hat though she was not looking at him.
And afterwards he stood among the fragments of his letter and watched till both the girl and the dog were out of sight.
Twenty-four hours later Hugh Durant stood on the sandy shore and tapped with his crutch on the large, flat stone that was set for a step on the threshold of the little, wooden cottage behind the sand dunes.