ter go ourselves." So we passed to the front
and in the other room met the two young people coming in from the
balcony. I was to wonder, in the light of later things, exactly how long
they had occupied together a couple of the set of cane chairs garnishing
the place in summer. If it had been but five minutes that only made
subsequent events more curious. "We must go, mother," Miss Mavis
immediately said; and a moment after, with a little renewal of chatter as
to our general meeting on the ship, the visitors had taken leave. Jasper
went down with them to the door and as soon as they had got off Mrs.
Nettlepoint quite richly exhaled her impression. "Ah but'll she be a
bore--she'll be a bore of bores!"

"Not through talking too much, surely."

"An affectation of silence is as bad. I hate that particular _pose_;
it's coming up very much now; an imitation of the English, like
everything else. A girl who tries to be statuesque at sea--that will act
on one's nerves!"

"I don't know what she tries to be, but she succeeds in being very
handsome."

"So much the better for you. I'll leave her to you, for I shall be shut
up. I like her being placed under my 'care'!" my friend cried.

"She'll be under Jasper's," I remarked.

"Ah he won't go," she wailed--"I want it too much!"

"But I didn't see it that way. I have an idea he'll go."

"Why didn't he tell me so then--when he came in?"

"He was diverted by that young woman--a beautiful unexpected girl sitting
there."

"Diverted from his mother and her fond hope?--his mother trembling for
his decision?"

"Well"--I pieced it together--"she's an old friend, older than we know.
It was a meeting after a long separation."

"Yes, such a lot of them as he does know!" Mrs. Nettlepoint sighed.

"Such a lot of them?"

"He has so many female friends--in the most varied circles."

"Well, we can close round her then," I returned; "for I on my side know,
or used to know, her young man."

"Her intended?"--she had a light of relief for this.

"The very one she's going out to. He can't, by the way," it occurred to
me, "be very young now."

"How odd it sounds--her muddling after him!" said Mrs. Nettlepoint.

I was going to reply that it wasn't odd if you knew Mr. Porterfield, but
I reflected that that perhaps only made it odder. I told my companion
briefly who he was--that I had met him in the old Paris days, when I
believed for a fleeting hour that I could learn to p