She thought it was the moan of the wind rising at first, then it sounded again almost at her feet—the shrill, sharp wail of an infant.
Xenie turned around and saw, not twenty paces from her, a little bundle of soft, white flannel lying upon the wet sand.
She ran forward with a scream of joy, and picked it up in her arms, and drew aside one corner of the little embroidered blanket.
Joy, joy! it was Lora's baby—Lora's baby, lying forlorn and deserted on the wet sand with the hungry waves rolling ever nearer and nearer toward it, as though eager to draw it down in their cold and fatal embrace.
With a low murmur of joy, Xenie kissed the cold little face and folded it closely in her arms.
"Lora cannot be very far now," she thought, her heart beating wildly with joy. "She was so weak the babe has slipped from her arms, and she did not know it. She will come back directly to find it."
She ran along the shore, looking through the gray dawn light everywhere for her sister, and calling aloud in tender accents:
"Lora, Lora, my darling!"
But suddenly, as she looked, she saw a strangely familiar form coming toward her along the sand.
It was a man clothed in a gray tweed traveling suit, such as tourists wear abroad.