The next morning floated in upon Isabelle’s senses, warm and fragrant. She felt that this was to be one of the most important days of her life. She loved and she was loved at last! It never entered her head that there could be any doubt of Captain O’Leary’s feelings for her. He had called her, tenderly, “little moonbeam,” and in one long rapturous dance it had come to them that the meaning of life was love.

She dressed in a daze of happiness, in the knowledge that presently she was to see him again. How would they meet? Where? What would the odious Darlington woman say when she knew that “the surly little thing” had captured her captain?

She took great pains with her toilet, stared at herself long in the glass. She wished she were beautiful, like Mrs.Darlington, or Max. He deserved the most radiant creature in the world! How could he care for a plain mite like herself? Did he?

In a sudden collapse into deep depression she sought Miss Watts and hurried her downstairs. No signs of him in the breakfast room. Later she led Miss Watts up and down every veranda, but a complete survey of the grounds brought no results.

“We ought not to exercise so violently right after breakfast, Isabelle. Let us sit down in the shade for a little.”

Isabelle agreed; it did not matter to her what they did just now, and these seats gave a view of every one who came out of the hotel.

“What shall we do to-day?” inquired Miss Watts.

“Oh—I don’t know”—indifferently.

Some people were coming out now. A tall woman, a girl, and a boy. The girl stared at Isabelle and then advanced.

“Aren’t you Isabelle Bryce?” she asked.

“Why, Agnes Pollock!” exclaimed Isabelle.

Introductions and explanations followed. The girls had known each other at Hill Top School. Agnes was convalescing from an appendicitis operation. She was with her mother and her brother, who greeted Isabelle cordially.

“Heard a lot about you!” said Percy Pollock, who was a beautiful blond person, slightly older than the girls. “You were the terror at Hill Top, weren’t you?”

“I didn’t have much chance. I was only there one year,” laughed Isabelle.

“I hope you’ll wake up this dull isle,” said he.

“Dull?” cried Isabelle, blushing furiously at her tone.

They all sat down together, in the aimless way of holiday makers, but Isabelle’s eyes were ever on the door. Where was the man? Did he lie abed all morning? And such a morning!

“Isabelle, let’s go for a walk down the beach. I’ve such heaps to tell you about Hill Top.”

“Good idea,” said Percy, promptly.

“Not you. Just Isabelle and me. We want to talk.”

“I—think I won’t this morning. I—I’d rather not,” began Isabelle.

Then she stopped short. He, the Son of the Morning, was coming forth. She scarcely noticed that Mrs.Darlington was with him. Her face was suddenly so radiant that the others turned to look. He saw them. Now he would come to her—show them how it was between them!

But he did no such thing. He bowed, a trifle absently, and passed within a few feet of them—near enough for them to hear him say:

“Paula, ever young and ever fair!”

They also saw the ravishing look she threw him.

“What a handsome man!” exclaimed Agnes.

“Lady-killer, I bet you,” jeered Percy.

“Come on, Agnes, let’s go for that walk on the beach,” cried Isabelle.

She started off almost before any one understood her purpose.

“Hi there! are you trailing me behind?” called Percy.

“No,” said Isabelle, shortly.

Agnes hurried after her, and when they had tramped the beach for a while, they sat down in the sand. Agnes remembered that Isabelle was “queer,” but there was something passionate about the way she threw herself into their reminiscences, that struck her as unnecessary. They spoke of Mrs.Benjamin, with tears on Agnes’s part. She told of Mr. Benjamin’s pitiful efforts to go on with the school. He had been forced to give up the struggle, and Agnes lamented the necessity of going to a new school when she returned to New York.

“Now tell me about you,” she demanded. “Why are you out of school?”

“I hated the school they sent me to last year, so this year I struck and went on the stage for a while.”

“Why, Isabelle Bryce!” cried her friend, thrilled to the bone.

“But I didn’t like it; it made me sick. So I, too came down here to get well.”

She evaded questions on the subject of her stage career, and after some desultory talk they went back to the hotel. People were strolling to the beach for the bathing hour.

“Let’s find Percy and go in,” said Agnes.

Isabelle, having agreed to meet them on the beach, hurried off to change. Miss Watts went down to the sea with her; she did not wait for Agnes and Percy. She struck out for the farther raft. There was one a hundred feet from shore, and one farther out, for expert swimmers. She had just passed the former when she became aware of some one in her wake, some one coming with speed. She slowed up a little.

“What do ye mean by swimmin’ off alone like this?” demanded a well-known voice. She made no answer, but she did not increase her speed. He came up beside her. “This is plain childish folly, that’s what it is,” he blustered.

Isabelle rolled on her back and smiled faintly at the sky.

“Ye ought to be spanked, ye little devil.”

“Some people are good at calling names,” she remarked to the sky.

“I’m tellin’ ye it’s dangerous for you to start off for that far raft alone.”

“Well, I’m asking you what business it is of yours?”

“Do ye want me to stand by and see ye drown yerself?”

“It’s my privilege to drown myself if I like,” she replied, as she struck off for the raft again. They swam to it in silence, and she pulled her slim satin body, like a shining eel, up onto the platform. He followed.

“You’re a very disturbin’ young person!” he said, sternly.

She lifted her eyebrows at him, with a baby stare. He looked away with a frown.

“Where is ‘Paula! ever young and ever fair’?” she inquired. “Is she displaying herself on the beach?”

He grinned.

“Not she. Paula is a very clever woman—she knows her own limitations,” he replied. “Hello! here comes somebody.”

It proved to be Major O’Dell, the man who had looked after Larry on shipboard. He glared at them and climbed aboard the raft.

“Larry, ye fool, what do ye mean by takin’ such a swim as this on yer first day?” he demanded, hotly.

“I came to rescue this young mermaid,” he answered.

“It’s damfoolishness—that’s what it is. I beg yer pardon, Miss—Miss——”

“Bryce” from Larry.

“This man is here convalescing, and it is folly for him to over-exert himself in any such manner,” he scolded her.

“I didn’t invite him to come,” said she. “He forced his society on me. Now that you’re here to tow him in, I’ll leave him to you,” she added; and with that she dived off.

“Wait a minute. Major O’Dell wants to rest,” cried the Captain.

“Let him. Let him rest a month,” came back the answer, as the shining head turned toward the distant shore.

“I’ve got to go after her, O’Dell. It isn’t safe,” protested Larry.

“Who appointed you her nurse?”

“Damn it! man, the child might drown.”

He went overboard and started after Isabelle. O’Dell, with a far-from-pretty word, followed. In some such procession they finally arrived at the beach. Isabelle stepped forth, shook her slim black self, ran up the beach and back like a colt, and joined Miss Watts, sedate as a debutante. Captain O’Leary approached them.

“Miss Watts,” said he, “it is none of my affair, of course, but if you have any authority over this young woman, you will forbid her to swim alone to the farther raft.”

Isabelle grinned at him, but he frowned and walked away without another word.

Isabelle spent the rest of the day near the hotel that she might be at hand if he came out, but there were no signs of him. Percy Pollock had introduced two boys, who urged the girls on all sorts of expeditions, but Isabelle was adamant. She could not bother with boys if there was any chance of another encounter.

Major O’Dell came out on the terrace, saw her, and strolled over.

“May I speak to you, Miss Bryce?”

She joined him and they walked over to a seat by a wall.

“I wish to apologize for being so short-tempered this morning,” he began.

“Yes, you were,” she replied.

“Captain O’Leary has been in bed since that junket you took him on this morning.”

“I didn’t take him,” said she, “he came.”

“He is in no condition to endure such a strain. I ask you not to let him do such a thing again.”

“I’m not his mother,” she burst out. “He is old enough to take care of himself and I do not intend to act as his trained nurse.”

She looked—and sounded—so young that Major O’Dell laughed.

“All right. I’ll tell him. You were on our boat, weren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Do you travel much, Miss Bryce?”

“Oh, not much. Why?”

“Have you ever been in the Far East?”

She glanced at him quickly. He was twisting the ends of his little moustache and gazing off to sea. Heavens! was this the man? She had almost forgotten the Chinese coat in the emotions which had swept her since landing.

“The Far East?” she managed to repeat with a semblance of indifference.

“Yes, the Philippines, Japan, or China.”

“No, I’ve never been there.”

“Um. You should go. Full of treasures, jewels, embroideries, brocades—all the things that women like”—he continued, looking directly at her.

“So?” queried Isabelle, obviously bored.

“I’m afraid I am keeping you from your friends. So I’m to look elsewhere for a nurse for Captain O’Leary?”

“Why don’t you try Mrs.Darlington?” she inquired. Then with a nod, she went back to her playmates.

An hour or so later a group of people, Mrs.Darlington among them, took a near-by table for tea. Major O’Dell and Captain O’Leary, the latter looking very white, came out and joined them. They did not look in her direction until she heard Mrs.Darlington remark:

“Larry, just see what a collection of little boys your ugly duckling has made.”

At this they all looked. Isabelle glanced at her little boys, and said something that made them shout with laughter. But it was not so loud but that the wind carried her his reply:

“She’s not my ugly duckling. She’s a wicked little leprechaun, born under a mushroom, on a black night, but she swims like a fish, and dances like a pixie. I tell ye she’s not human at all at all!”

She heard their laughter, and her eyes smarted. What a fool he had made of her! How she despised herself. There was only one way to square it, to get back her self-respect. She would find out what a leprechaun meant, and she would bedevil the honourable Captain O’Leary, like the pixie that he named her!

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