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Odd Fellows' Hall was the biggest and most pretentious building

in Freekirk Head. It was of two stories height, and on its

gray-painted front bore the three great gilt links of the

society. To one side of it stood a wreck of a former factory, and

behind it was the tiny village "lockup."

It marked the spot where the highway turned south at right angles

on its wild journey southwest, a journey that ended in a leap

into space from the three hundred foot cliffs of gull-haunted,

perpendicular Southern Head.

The interior of the hall was in its gala attire. Two rows of huge

oil-lamps extended down the middle from back to front; others

were in brackets down the side walls, and three more above the

low rostrum at the far end. The chairs were in place, the windows

open, and the two young fishermen who acted as janitors of the

hall stood at the rear, greeting those that arrived with familiar

jocularity.