The bus leaped forward in a cloud of evil blue smoke and a clashing of gears, as if it could hardly wait to get away. Miriam Chase watched it careen off down the narrow, twisting road that looped by the water front and thence out of town. She was left alone in the street between the hotel and the post office. A cold wind was rushing like the sea through the barren branches of the elms and the only other living thing in sight was a gull which coasted, remote and aloof from the earth, white-winged against a roller of slate-blue cloud.....
