TO THE LIGHTHOUSE

door, standing looking up into the sky. Andrew
had his net and basket. That meant he was goinj
to catch crabs and things. That meant he woult
climb out on to a rock; he would be cut off. 0
coming back single file on one of those littl<
paths above the cliff one of them might slip. H<
would roll and then crash. It was growing quite
dark.

But she did not let her voice change in the
least as she finished the story, and added, shutting
the book, and speaking the last words as if she
had made them up herself, looking into James's
eyes: " And there they are living still at this very
time."

" And that's the end," she said, and she saw in
his eyes, as the interest of the story died away in{
them, something else take its place; something;
wondering, pale, like the reflection of a light,!
which at once made him gaze and marvel. Turn-;
ing, she looked across the bay, and there, surej
enough, coming regularly across the waves first'
two quick strokes and then one long steady stroke,!
was the light of the Lighthouse. It had been lit.
In a moment he would ask he^ " Are we;
going to the Lighthouse? " And she would have;
to say, "No; not to-morrow; your father says;
not." Happily, Mildred came in to fetch them, i
and the bustle distracted them. But he kept!
98 . i