And in that moment he would have cast away the whole bulk of his great
possessions for one precious day of youth out of the many that had fled
away for ever.
A woman's laugh, high, inconsequent, rang through the great coffee-room,
and all but one looked towards the corner whence it proceeded. An
American voice began at once to explain the joke with considerable
volubility.
Bernard Merefleet rose from his chair with a frowning countenance and
made his way down to the old stone quay below the hotel.
CHAPTER II
The air was keen and salt. He paused on the well-worn stone wall and
turned his face to the spray. A hundred memories were at work in his
brain, and the relief of solitude was unspeakable. It was horribly
lonely, but he hugged his loneliness. That laughing voice in the hotel
coffee-room had driven him forth to seek it. No mental or physical
discomfort would have induced him to return.
He propped himself against a piece of stonework and gazed moodily out to
sea. He did not want to leave this haven of his childhood. Yet the
thought of remaining in close proximity to a party of tourists was
detestable to him. Why in the world couldn't they stop away, he wondered
savagely? And then his own inconsistency occurred to him, and he smiled
grimly. For the place undoubtedly had its charm.
A fisherman in a blue jersey lounged on to the quay at this point of
his meditations, and, old habit asserting itself, Merefleet greeted
him with a remark on the weather.
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