Faintly and with a gentle rhythm the murmur of the sea came across the land and the air was sweet with the sea-salt and the fresh scent of the grass after rain.Maggie stood for a moment, breathing in the spring air and watching the watery blue thread its timid way through banks of grey cloud.A rich gleam of sunlight struck the path at her feet.
She saw then, coming towards her, a man and a woman.The woman was ordinary enough, a middle-aged, prim, stiffly dressed person with a pale shy face, timid in her walk and depressed in mouth and eyes.
The man was a stout, short, thick-set fellow with a rosy smiling face.At once Maggie noticed his smile.He was dressed very smartly in a black coat and waist-coat and pepper-and-salt trousers.His bowler was cocked a little to one side.She passed them and the little round man, looking her full in the face, smiled so happily and with so radiant an amiability that she was compelled to respond.
The woman did not look at her.
Long after she had left them she thought of the little man's smile.
There was something that, in spite of herself, reminded her both of Uncle Mathew and Martin.She felt a sudden and warm kinship, something that she had not known since her arrival in Skeaton.Had she not struggled with herself every kind of reminiscence of her London life would have come crowding about her.This meeting was like the first little warning tap upon the wall...
On her return she spoke of it.
"Oh," said Paul, "that must have been poor little Mr.Toms with his sister.""Poor?" asked Maggie.
"Yes.He's queer in his head, you know," said Paul."Quite harmless, but he has the strangest ideas."Maggie noticed then that Grace shivered and the whole of her face worked with an odd emotion of horror and disgust.