The intense feeling of regret and sorrow would often quite overcome her as she walked back towards the ford with Marie, and the tears often came to her eyes as she reflected on the possible consequences of her intervention. She feared that it might be even more serious than the strong nature of her friend promised.
With these feelings, and with an occasional overpowering emotion which affected Marie as well, they now came in sight of the ford, and the appearance of the Forests on the other side, and their signals of welcome caused her to put a strong restraint upon her feelings. They were soon able to converse across the channel which rippled out softly and laid bare the higher stones of the ford.
Miss Forest was in the greatest good humor. She said at once, when her friend came within speaking distance:
"It is all arranged, Grace. We go in the morning."
"Marie," she continued, "you and your father and Suzanne must come with us. We have arranged for everything, and you must come."
Miss Gaston left Marie with a few kind words, and as the tide had fallen, she stepped over the rocks of the ford and joined her friends.
Marie passed up the steep road to Bluff House still oppressed with the grief that had called forth her sympathy with Miss Gaston. From the summit Winslow himself, seated alone, looked down upon the scene presented to his view, and gave himself up for the time to the emotions which his experience of the afternoon left him. He recalled the whole incident, and for the first time he found that the child woman had in some mysterious way been the cause of all his present unhappiness. He recalled what Miss Gaston had said in regard to Marie and himself, and he wondered how it was possible for her to suppose him occupying the position she had assumed for him in the life of the Acadian maiden. He saw Miss Gaston going up the beach towards the mainland, and as her form grew smaller and at last was lost to view in the road which turned along the side of the hill, he looked at Marie coming nearer and nearer as she ascended with slow steps the island road. Her form stood out with bolder lines, and her large eyes and beautiful face had taken a new quality in his eyes. He found himself thinking about her as a woman, not as a child, as he had done previously. The influence of Miss Gaston on him was already at work, and in the confusion of his thoughts he did not fail to realize that from that day the two women who had so much to do with his destiny had suddenly fallen from the position he had falsely placed them in, and had by a rapid turn of affairs assumed the place they rightly belonged to, and which also changed considerably his own position in regard to them.