The tall man seemed to have disappeared. Not only did he never
cross the threshold, but he never so much as showed face at a
window; or, at least, not so far as I could see; for I dared not
creep forward beyond a certain distance in the day, since the upper
floor commanded the bottoms of the links; and at night, when I
could venture farther, the lower windows were barricaded as if to
stand a siege. Sometimes I thought the tall man must be confined
to bed, for I remembered the feebleness of his gait; and sometimes
I thought he must have gone clear away, and that Northmour and the
young lady remained alone together in the pavilion. The idea, even
then, displeased me.
Whether or not this pair were man and wife, I had seen abundant
reason to doubt the friendliness of their relation. Although I
could hear nothing of what they said, and rarely so much as glean a
decided expression on the face of either, there was a distance,
almost a stiffness, in their bearing which showed them to be either
unfamiliar or at enmity. The girl walked faster when she was with
Northmour than when she was alone; and I conceived that any
inclination between a man and a woman would rather delay than
accelerate the step. Moreover, she kept a good yard free of him,
and trailed her umbrella, as if it were a barrier, on the side
between them. Northmour kept sidling closer; and, as the girl
retired from his advance, their course lay at a sort of diagonal
across the beach, and would have landed them in the surf had it
been long enough continued.
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