Denis Quirk's absence was a great relief to Sylvia Jackson. She still entertained a tender admiration for him, but, as he continued to resist her fascinations, she preferred that he should not be present to frustrate or ridicule her plans. Mrs. Quirk and Kathleen were easily duped, but she feared the penetration of Denis Quirk. Nevertheless she made pretence of a great disappointment.
"We counted on you," she remarked in an agonised voice.
"Never count on a paper man. We are the most unreliable people in the world," he answered. "Make the old mother happy, and don't keep her out too late."
With these words he went down the avenue whistling the air of a melody that Kathleen had sung the night before.
Sylvia had studied her plans with the greatest care, and she put them into action when they were safely arrived at the strip of beach that lies beyond the river bar.
"You and Granny prefer to be alone," she told Kathleen. "I intend to take my sketch book and see what I can do with the view round the point."
Therewith she sauntered away, giving them no time to protest. The spot she had chosen for her sketch is one of the most magnificent on the coast.
It is a small patch of sand, terminated towards the east by black precipitous rocks, against which the sea is perpetually pounding in great breakers. On this day the sea was a wonderful dark blue, and very peaceful, save where it thundered at the base of the cliffs. On the horizon a bank of grey clouds rested on the water like a remote island crowned with mounts and peaks. The smoke of a distant steamer rose in an almost straight line upwards; nearer the shore a small fishing boat was moving gently backwards and forwards, its sails barely filled by the gentle breeze. There was a sense of rest in the scene, as if the ocean were slumbering after the strife of a few days previously.
Here Sylvia found the artist, working quietly at a picture that he had almost completed. He had caught the vivid colouring of the ocean, the grey bank of clouds and the distant smoke, and had transferred them to his canvas.