In her dainty trappings, with the shadow from her hat in her eyes and folds of her crisp muslin dress in one sunburnt hand to keep it from the soil of the road, she might have been a stranger on a first stroll through the curious little town that smelled rankly of fish, instead of a maid born and bred in those parts. Finally she paused before a window where yellow oilskin coats were grotesquely displayed, together with lanterns and canvas pails and other objects of signal interest to one of her sex and age; and at that instant Emil, lounging in the door of the hotel opposite with a pipe planted between his lips, spied her.
For two blocks she walked rapidly, and when she did permit him to overtake her, she scarcely gave answer to his greeting. As if by mutual consent they turned their steps in the direction of the old Burying Point, a rocky promontory at the town's edge where for two centuries Old Harbour had persistently discovered graves for its dead among the boulders. Rocks and bones of men disputed the place, and yet, what more fit than that they should be laid to rest there, those staunch old captains and brave wives, whose very spirits had more in common with rocks than with flowers? Yet flowers bloomed there in scanty elegance, and sprays of 'lady's ear-drop' and 'Queen Anne's lace,' testifying to some feminine grace hidden away in neighbouring graves, caught and clung to Rachel's dress as she passed.
Emil, who was frankly pleased to see her, kept laughing loudly as he switched off the heads of the tall grass: but Rachel turned away her face and bit her lip; now that she saw him, she was indifferent to him. She was not thoroughly aware of her own actions until they were accomplished. Constantly something vast fought within her. Indeed, in this scrap of a girl was manifest one of the greatest desires, the greatest volitions of the universe.
Reaching the edge of the cemetery where it ran out in a jutting cliff that commanded a view of extended range and beauty, she sank down on an old seat and cast a challenging glance at Emil.
"Is the depth indicator complete?" she asked. "I did not know that you considered it finished."
"Yes, it's practically finished," he answered; "anyhow, I shan't be able to do anything more to it for the present. I've got to finish my lithographic outfit. They're hurrying me. I'm heartily sick of it, but there's nothing else to be done."
"Of course you must finish it," she agreed quickly, and the last little cloud vanished from her eyes.
With instinctive tact she began making more attractive to him the duty that lay before him. She made him explain the salient features of the lithographic improvement and she nodded her head sagely at each point as if she understood. Then she praised its ingenuity. Finally, having divined his feeling for his mother, she hinted at her pleasure in his success.
"Your mother must be excited these days," she said, "and proud, too."
The glow in his glance had been deepening, and pride was visible all over him, but at the mention of his mother his expression changed.