Charles went soberly down the green slopes towards the sea, and presently discovered the dismantled fort they had seen from the steamer as they ran up the Swinge that morning.  And sitting on the broken wall of a gun platform was a figure which he knew by the dress to be Miss Penny.

She had evidently been on the look-out for him.  She stood up and waved her hand, and he waved his in reply, and plunged down the slope.  His heart was sore at what had just passed.  It turned gratefully to one whom he knew to be full of sympathy for him.

When he reached the foot of the hill, they were crossing the causeway which led from the fort to the shore.

“Well, old man, you’ve got through with it?” said Graeme; and all their faces showed the anxiety that was in them to know how he had prospered.

He nodded.  “Let’s go back and sit there for a few minutes.  I feel like a whipped dog;” and they all went back to the fort, which, in its dismantlement and ruin, whispered soothingly of the rest and peace that sometimes lie beyond broken hopes and strenuous times.

“Well, how did you find him?” asked Graeme, as they seated themselves on the broken wall again, with the fair blue plain of the sea dimpling and dancing in front.

“Very broken, but as obstinate as ever,” said Charles gloomily.  “Wouldn’t listen to my proposal, says he’s set on redeeming himself, and so on.  I offered him all I could, but it was no use.  So I left him—­”

“You never did—­” began Miss Penny, with a pained look on her face.

“I did.  But I couldn’t leave it so.  I went back, and he was sitting with his head in his hands....  I just gave him all I had brought and came away....  I know it was all wrong—­”

“It wasn’t.  You did quite right,” said Miss Penny vehemently.

“I don’t suppose any of us would have done differently when it came to the point.  I don’t really see what else you could have done,” said Graeme.

“He reminded me of all he had done for me when I was a boy, and so on, and told me that if I didn’t help him there was no hope for him.  I did my best—­”

“You have done quite right, Charles,” said Margaret.  “I do hope he will get away all right.”

As he gave them the details of his interview, their quiet sympathy restored him by degrees to himself.  The bruised, whipped soreness wore off, to some extent at all events, and there remained chiefly a feeling of thankfulness that the matter was over, and that, in doing the only thing possible to him, if he offended against the law, he had still done what commended itself to his own heart and to those whose good opinion he chiefly valued.

If there were no signs of merriment about them as they wandered quietly about the strand, if they still bore something of the aspect of a funeral party, it was at all events the aspect of a party after the funeral.  Their corpse was laid, so far as they were concerned, and their thoughts and hearts were more at liberty to turn to other matters.