About a week after this occurrence, he was taking one of his usual moody walks along the beach, his hands clasped behind him, and his eyes following the golden path that led away over the waters down to the sinking sun. He walked along listlessly, insensible to everything save the subtle solemnity of the hour, when the brooding calm of the evening began to settle over the crimson wave and the flushed earth. He did not observe a figure leaning against a huge boulder that lay rosy-red right in his path. The leaning figure was that of a young man, who, like George, was surveying the scene, but with an air of genuine admiration curiously tempered by the eye of a connoisseur examining a painting as to the merits or defects of which his oracular opinion might be called for at any moment by a listening world. Let us look at him as he leans back there, so contented, to all seeming, with the world in general, and possibly with himself in particular; for notwithstanding an occasional touch of what in others would be called impertinence, but in him was really rather assumed than natural, and, as he was wont to say, often got him out of difficulties, Ned Fitzgerald was a fellow you would like.
His slim, well-knit figure, clad in a light summer suit, his pleasant, animated face surmounted by a straw hat that became him, his bright eyes glancing around and taking all in in a sweep--the sinking sun, the mingling colors on the waters, the flush on the hills, the blood-red glow on the sands, the quiet circles of a solitary sea-bird that turned and dipped its snow-white wings in the rosy light--to one looking at him, he made nature seem all the more lovely and enjoyable for having one who could feel its loveliness so thoroughly and so evidently.
The quick eye did not take long to pick out the slightly stooped figure that seemed so wrapt in silent thought, and, as it neared him, never turned its gaze from the dying sun. Mr. Ned Fitzgerald watched its approach, and, with his usual tendency to be sociable, evidently contemplated addressing it; when, as it came close enough to distinguish the features, he started from his recumbent position, took off his hat and tossed it wildly in the air, never waiting to catch it again, but, rushing towards George, seized that astounded and miserable mortal in his arms, and hugged him almost to suffocation before he could see who it was, whilst the exclamation burst from him: