HE bench by the door of Laban's Folly is not much of a bench, but it must be comfortable enough, for it has supported many a back against the wall of the Folly, while the sun shone warm upon it and the gentle southwest wind blew in the faces of the owners of the backs. It has even performed that office many times in the mornings, when the sun does not shine upon it but it is in shade. And on this morning the shade would not have been ungrateful, and the breeze would have fanned the faces of the sitters, and they would have sat there whittling, perhaps, or doing nothing but smoke their leisurely pipes; and they would have looked out over the wharf, and their gaze might have been arrested by the three men who sat upon the string-piece fishing silently.
And the gaze of the sitters would pass beyond the men fishing, as it would pass beyond the nest of piles at the corner of the wharf, as being a thing familiar and of no moment, and it would linger on the surface of the harbor, where many small boats and a few larger ones swung at their moorings, and where the breeze ruffled the water and little waves danced in the sun; and it would soon pass to the opposite shore of the harbor, where many windmills turned above little square, weather-beaten roofs, pumping up water for the making of salt. Here their gaze would linger the longest, and they would marvel afresh that Hannibal Horne should have bought the old salt-works some years before. They were never done wondering at that. But they marvelled still more that he was engaged in the making of salt—or, rather, it was Helena, his wife, who attended to that. As for Hannibal himself, the war had taken him elsewhere.
But the bench was empty when a big motor-car came swiftly and silently down the wharf, and came silently to rest beside it, and the door opened and a girl got out—girl or woman, it was not easy to tell which, for a veil covered her face. Her figure was that of a girl but her bearing that of a woman, proud but listless, as if life had turned to ashes in her mouth.
She looked about her and she pushed her veil aside, disclosing the face of a young woman of a cold and stony kind of beauty. She spoke to the chauffeur, and her voice was low and even and clear and hard as steel.
"This must be the place," she said. "There are the harbor and the boats and the wind and the opposite shore and the windmills. There is even this ugly square building on the wharf. I will sit here a while. You may wait."
The chauffeur bowed, and the girl sat down upon the bench, rigid and erect, and again she looked around.
"Eleanor told me," she murmured, "to sit here for an hour and not to think. I will do the best I can."
So she sat there, gazing out and seeing nothing, while the sunshine lay hot upon the wharf and the shadow which the building cast before her got less and less. And the soft wind blew gently in her face as she sat, and it made little soft noises with its blowing, and there were the gentle sounds of the little waves and little distant noises—the cluck of a block, the sound of oars in a boat, the subdued talk of men that she could not see, the soft, drowsing silence of a hot morning, the lazy clatter of a horse's hoofs on the wooden bridge, the gentle clacking of the windmills on the opposite shore as they turned in the sun.
The salt wind and the little soft sounds soothed the girl sitting there. She was no longer erect and rigid, but leaning forward, crossed arms upon her knees. Her eyes had a softer look. The clacking of the windmills was louder and more rapid, and there was no shadow before her, but the sunlight lay upon the bench and shone upon her dark hair where it had escaped beneath her veil, and brought out a tinge of red in it.
She sat straight once more. "Fayette," she said, "how long have I been here?"
"An hour and a quarter. Miss Challis."
There came a burst of clacking from the windmills. She rose and went toward the car.
"I will go now and see the salt-works—those clattering windmills," she said. "They make salt over there, I have a fancy to see the place."