One of the maids broke into a keening cry, shrill and wild as a gull’s, but the wind whipped it from her lips.
A great wave broke in thunder on the beach. They could scarcely hear it: they felt the shock in the earth they stood on. The wind snatched the foam from the crest, tore the foam into mist, and drove the mist through the garden. When they cleared the salt from their eyes they saw a young fir-seedling, growing just outside the lower terrace, heel over in a slow arc and vanish.
The old shepherd turned a white face to Simmons. “Th’ water’s o’er the beach road.”
“Lord ha’ mercy on ’em.”
Gradually they one and all drew to the head of the stone steps where the master stood, and huddled behind him, silent now. He did not heed them. He was as still as the little faun, who lay smiling and sleeping in the storm; the pale light gleamed on the marble till it had the likeness of a body from which the life had gone like a flown bird.
Launce looked at his uncle fearfully, and his face, colourless and streaming with spray, was like the face of a drowned man. The child looked away trembling, and would not look back. And he it was at last who pointed and screamed: “I see them! They’re there—”
“Where, then?”
“The boy’s dreaming. ’Tis too late—”
“There’s naught but the scud and the driving weed.”
But William stooped his face to the child’s. “Where did you see them, laddie?” His face was torn with pain and dripping with foam, but it was no longer dead. The boy did not fear it.