oth laughed, too much blown about to
speak. She drove open the door of her room and stepped into its calm. In
order to speak to her, it was necessary that Richard should follow. They
stood in a whirlpool of wind; papers began flying round in circles, the
door crashed to, and they tumbled, laughing, into chairs. Richard sat
upon Bach.

"My word! What a tempest!" he exclaimed.

"Fine, isn't it?" said Rachel. Certainly the struggle and wind had given
her a decision she lacked; red was in her cheeks, and her hair was down.

"Oh, what fun!" he cried. "What am I sitting on? Is this your room? How
jolly!" "There--sit there," she commanded. Cowper slid once more.

"How jolly to meet again," said Richard. "It seems an age. _Cowper's
Letters_? . . . Bach? . . . _Wuthering Heights_? . . . Is this where
you meditate on the world, and then come out and pose poor politicians
with questions? In the intervals of sea-sickness I've thought a lot of
our talk. I assure you, you made me think."

"I made you think! But why?"

"What solitary icebergs we are, Miss Vinrace! How little we can
communicate! There are lots of things I should like to tell you
about--to hear your opinion of. Have you ever read Burke?"

"Burke?" she repeated. "Who was Burke?"

"No? Well, then I shall make a point of sending you a copy. _The_
_Speech_ _on_ _the_ _French_ _Revolution_--_The_ _American_ _Rebellion_?
Which shall it be, I wonder?" He noted something in his pocket-book.
"And then you must write and tell me what you think of it. This
reticence--this isolation--that's what's the matter with modern life!
Now, tell me about yourself. What are your interests and occupations?
I should imagine that you were a person with very strong interests. Of
course you are! Good God! When I think of the age we live in, with
its opportunities and possibilities, the mass of things to be done and
enjoyed--why haven't we ten lives instead of one? But about yourself?"

"You see, I'm a woman," said Rachel.

"I know--I know," said Richard, throwing his head back, and drawing his
fingers across his eyes.

"How strange to be a woman! A young and beautiful woman," he continued
sententiously, "has the whole world at her feet. That's true, Miss
Vinrace. You have an inestimable power--for good or for evil. What
couldn't you do--" he broke off.

"What?" asked Rachel.

"You have beauty," he said. The ship lurched. Rachel fell slightly
forward. Richard took her in his arms an