trying to hook it again, not succeeding and persisting in the attempt, while every instant tinged her cheeks with a livelier rose.
Owen watched her in silence, smiling behind his moustache. Then he leaned over, took hold of her hand, and fastened it for her. He was pleasantly stimulated by the tremor he felt running through her when his fingers touched her skin.
Then the boy burst open the door, handed his sister the glasses, and flung himself down with his wearying laugh, on the cushion beside her.
"I love dogs," he said to Owen, just as he had done before, "don't you? They are so faithful." It appeared to be a stock phrase of his, beyond which he could not get.
During the next six weeks Owen was often at Mon Désir, and his visits to Agnes and his assignations with Margot afforded him agreeable alternative recreation from his work.
He had known for long, however, that Agnes was in love with him—he had for long made up his mind that she and her ten thousand pounds were desirable possessions—before he said any word to the girl herself. And then, as generally happens, the crisis came fortuitously, unpremeditatedly. They were out on the cliffs together. She had been showing him Berceau Bay, which lies below Mon Désir. They had stepped from a door in the garden into a green lane, and followed it down, down through veils and mazes of April greenness, until it suddenly stopped with them on a grassy plateau overlooking the winged bay. At their feet the shadow of the hill behind them lay upon the water, but out farther it sparkled in the sunshine with jewel-like colour and brilliancy. When they had climbed the steep cliff path on theother
