But there they were coming up from the beach like happy children.
"Then I'll bring a boat along at one to-morrow," said the major, as he climbed into the tilbury. "I can't get away before, and we'll try and get to the Craig. It's eighteen miles south, so if this north-west wind holds good we shall have plenty of time, shan't we?"
"Plenty of time!" echoed Marrion happily.
But she had been happy every day of those six weeks, and even now, though the hair money was running short, and she knew she must be up and doing in a few days, she would not, could not, think of the future. Sufficient to the day was the evil and the good thereof.
Half an hour after Marmaduke's departure, however, she came out of the inn-parlour with a heightened colour. It had been no use attempting to explain the position to the landlady, it was foolish to mind what she had said; the more so as, automatically, that position must end in a day or two; still it was disturbing!
In this early September the twilights were long and the sky was still golden high up to the zenith. She threw a shawl over her head and, taking a boat, sculled herself across the ferry for a calming walk down the coast-line.
"The banks and braes of bonny Doon!"
The song kept echoing in her head. How pinchbeck it all was, that love of which men sung--
"But my false lover stole the rose,
But, ah, he left the thorn wi' me!"
That was a man's view of it. He came, he saw, he conquered. Then he could ride away leaving a thorn behind him. But why? She laughed aloud as she thought of her own passionate love for Duke, a love nothing could touch, a love that was unsoilable, unassailable, untouchable!