Somebody interposed.—"Here, chuck it, Percy; somebody might come in.... Hallo, John Willie, you off?"
For John Willie had pushed back his chair. He reached for his hat. "Leave us a lock of your hair for my mourning-brooch," Percy's muffled voice came after him, but he was off.
Perhaps she would be at the Wheel....
But she was not at that immense tyre slung with upholstered coaches, nor yet to be seen at the side-shows round about. He left the Kursaal, and joined the dense throng that made a double stream under the Promenade lamps. He told himself he was a fool. She might have left Llanyglo within a few hours of his having seen her—might be back in any of the towns of England or Scotland or Wales by this time. But he did not cease to seek. He reached the Pier again. Drub-drub-drub-drub-drub-drub-drub. It was now solid with flesh, and indeed he had not walked half its length when the closing-bell clanged. The glow over the pier-head Pavilion went suddenly out, and so, a few moments later, did a hundred yards of the lamps on either side. He heard the usual cries of mock-terror. It was no good going up there now....
Nor would she be in the Floral Valley. In fact, he had better give it up. He had better clear out of Llanyglo for a bit. He was sick of this dusty dance of pleasure, and the Wakes crowds would be here in a few days.... He would go and fish up Delyn. The Water Scheme hadn't spoiled the lake; they had only built a quite small dam with locks at one end, and the grid of service-reservoirs was lower down. Sharpe had left the hut. He would go there for a few days and have his bread and mutton and cheese sent up from the inn in the valley below. He would tell Minetta to get somebody to stay with her, and would go in the morning....
He was passing the closed fancy-shop at the corner of Gardd Street when he came to this resolution; and suddenly he stopped dead. Minetta!... What was it that the thought of his sister, coming at this moment, reminded him of? It was odd, but it had certainly reminded him of something that had seemed to come near him only to escape him again immediately. Minetta!... He saw Minetta daily. There was nothing new about Minetta. She looked after the house, and if he wasn't going to be in for meals he mentioned the fact, or sometimes didn't, and beyond that, to tell the truth, he didn't very often think of Minetta. He didn't suppose she would ever marry—wasn't that kind. He remembered that years ago that genial idiot Percy Briggs had fancied himself "sweet" on her, but that sketching of hers——
Ah!
John Willie, who had been still standing at the corner, moved slowly forward again. He had got it.
He knew he'd been right! It was a little boast of his that he remembered faces rather well, and the thing that had perplexed him for two days was now clear. In a flash he saw in his mind the Llanyglo of the days of the Briggses and Laceys. He saw a bright diminutive picture of deck-chairs and bathing-tents on the shore, and June Lacey and Wiggie having their fortunes told. And he saw a gipsy child, with a head held as if it had borne an invisible pitcher, and then a foot cut by a piece of glass, and himself and Percy packed off home in disgrace, and Percy's mother washing the gashed foot with water from a picnic-basket and tying it up with a handkerchief. Then Minetta had come up, and had said that she was going to make a sketch of the child....
Ah! It was she who had stood under the red pier-light, watching that cadmium horn of the moon that lifted itself out of the sea!