Muriel gazed at them awed by their loveliness, her hands tight clasped. As Gene watched her, he wished that all girls might be as utterly unconscious of self as she was. Not a move did she ever make to attract him. She was as natural in all that she did as were the seagulls that circled over the cliff.
His thoughts were interrupted by Muriel, who looked up with a troubled expression in her eyes. “Gene,” she said, “’tisn’t right for me to keep ’em. They aren’t mine, and I cal’late they’re wurth a power o’ money. Aren’t they?”
The boy nodded. “A fortune, I judge.”
“I’d like to give ’em back to the gal as lost ’em, if I knew who ’twas.”
Gene had idly lifted from the jewel case a locket and had opened it. On one side was the portrait of a proud, beautiful girl, and on the other was a picture of himself. He snapped it shut and, replacing it in the box, he rose rather abruptly, saying: “Muriel, let’s finish our search for the owner’s name at some future time. Shall we? You know we started out to dig clams.”
Muriel was rather surprised, but as her patient did seem weary, she replaced the green dress and went with him to the beach below.
Gene wanted time to think.
CHAPTER XVIII.
MEMORIES.
The next morning Captain Ezra asked Gene if he would like to go to the Outer Ledge and spend the day fishing, as the supply in the barrel was getting low. The lad was glad to go, and, as Muriel had baking to do, she was equally pleased to be alone.
Long, silent hours these were for Gene as he sat with the captain waiting for the coming of the fish that seemed reluctant to be caught in the early morning. Long, thoughtful hours. Now and then the lad even forgot where he was until a wave, larger than the others, rocked the boat and recalled to him his whereabouts. He was living over again a chapter in his past.