"He's mine, at any rate," she told herself fiercely. "Even if he doesn't love me, he is my husband, and nobody else can have him."
It was some sort of comfort to know that the adored Chris was hers. The knowledge sent some streak of sunshine across the blackness of last night.
She strolled along restlessly, blind to the beauty of the sea and sky, lost in her own bruised, bewildered thoughts. She had passed the boy with the shrimping net, and had come abreast with the man sauntering at the water's edge without noticing it, until he spoke to her.
"Good morning, Mrs. Lawless."
She started, flushing painfully as her eyes met the kindly quizzical gaze of "Feathers."
He looked uglier than ever in the morning sunshine, was her first bitter thought, and he wore a loose, collarless shirt which was open at the neck and showed his thick, muscular throat.
His big feet were thrust into not over-clean white canvas shoes, and a damp towel and bathing costume hung inelegantly over one shoulder.
"Good morning," said Marie. "I thought I was the first one up," she added resentfully.
He laughed carelessly.
"I'm always up with the lark—or aren't there any larks at a place like this? I've had a dip—I like the sea to myself, before it's crowded with flappers and fat old ladies."