He had known and loved the old town
in his youth, long before the new one had been built or even thought
of. For New Silverstrand was a growth of barely ten years.
In all his wanderings his heart had always turned with a warm thrill of
memory to the little old fishing-town where much of his restless boyhood
had been spent. He had returned to it as to a familiar friend and found
it but slightly changed. A new hotel had been erected where the old
Crayfish Inn had once stood. And this, so far as he had been able to
judge in his first walk through the place on the evening of his arrival,
was the sole alteration.
He had heard that the shore had crumbled beyond the town, but he had left
that to be investigated on the morrow. The fishing-harbour was the same;
the brown-sailed fishing-boats rocked with the well-remembered swing
inside; the water poured roaring in with the same baffled fury; and
children played as of old on the extreme and dangerous edge of the stone
quay.
The memory of that selfsame quay roused deeper recollections in
Merefleet's mind as he sat and dined alone at the little table near the
door.
There came to him the thought, with a sudden, stabbing regret, of a
little dark-eyed sister who had hung with him over that perilous edge and
laughed at the impotent breakers below. He could hear the silvery echoes
of her laughter across half a lifetime, could feel the warm hand that
clasped his own.
Pages:
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260