They came unexpectedly upon the sea. Meeting it without preparation as they did, robbed of anticipation, a common disappointment seized them. They were climbing the hill in the night when the headlights abruptly probed solid blackness, became two parallel luminous tubes which broadened out into a faint mist of light and ended. Mark stopped the car and switched off the lights and they sat looking at the water, which, there being no moon out, at first could be distinguished from the sky only by an absence of stars.