well-set-up young man and the girl in her pretty summer dress—disappeared from view. Then Florence turned to Kitty.

"It is?" said Florence.

Kitty nodded.

"Who would have believed it?" continued Florence. She started up in her excitement.

"I do not think I can quite stand this," she said.

"But where has she come from?" said Kitty again.

"How can I tell? I never want to see her wicked face again."

"She looks just as young as she did six years ago," said Kitty. Then she added impulsively: "I am sorry I have seen her again; I never could bear her face. Do you think her eyes were set quite straight in her head, Florence?"

"I don't know anything about that," answered Florence recklessly. "Long ago she did me a great deal of harm. There came a time when I almost hated her. Whether her eyes are straight or not, her mind at least is crooked. Who is that man she is with?"

"He is good-looking and looks nice also," said Kitty.

Florence made no reply. The girls paced up and down together; but somehow the edge of the day's enjoyment seemed gone. They went in to their midday meal between twelve and one, and afterwards Kitty, who said she felt a little tired, went to lie down. Florence, however, was still restless and perturbed; she hated the thought of the vicinity[Pg 22] of Bertha Keys, and yet she had a curious longing to know something about her.

[Pg 22]

"I am not going to fight shy of her or to show her that I am in the least afraid of her," thought Florence; "I can make myself much more disagreeable to her and much more dangerous than she can ever make herself to me. I wonder where she is staying?"

Mrs. Aylmer proposed that she and her daughter should spend the afternoon on the sands.

"Let us visit the shrimp-woman and get some fresh shrimps and perhaps a crab or a lobster for supper," said the little Mummy, holding out a bait which would have quite won the day in the old times. But Florence had outgrown her taste for these special dainties.

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