" said Agatha, "Yes, Nettie, I shall go the day after
to-morrow."

"Mr. Merceron asked to be introduced to me," said Nettie proudly. "And
he asked where you were--he said he'd seen you at the window."

"Did he?" said Agatha negligently; and Nettie, finding the conversation
flag, retired to her own room.

Agatha sat a moment longer on the bed.

"What a very deceitful young man," she exclaimed at last. "I must be a
very strict secret indeed. Well, I suppose I should be."

CHAPTER IV

A CATASTROPHE AT THE POOL

Mr. Vansittart Merceron was not quite sure that Victor Sutton had any
business to call him "Merceron." He was nearly twenty years older than
Victor, and a man of considerable position; nor was he, as some
middle-aged men are, flattered by the implication of
contemporaneousness carried by the mode of address. But it is hard to
give a hint to a man who has no inkling that there is room for one; and
when Mr. Vansittart addressed Victor as 'Mr. Sutton' the latter
graciously told him to "hang the Mister." Reciprocity was inevitable,
and the elder man asked himself, with a sardonic grin, how soon he
would be "Van."

"Coming to bathe, Merceron?" he heard under his window at eight o'clock
the next morning. "We're off to the Pool."

Mr. Vansittart shouted an emphatic negative, and the two young fellows
started off by themselves. Charlie's manner was affected by the
ceremonious courtesy which a well-bred host betrays towards a guest not
very well-beloved, but Victor did not notice this. It seldom occurred
to him that people did not like him.

"Yes," he was saying, "I'm just twenty-nine. I've had my fling,
Charlie, and now I shall get to business."

Charlie was relieved to find that according to this reckoning he had
several more years 'fling' before him.

"Next year," pursued Victor, "I shall marry; then I shall go into
Parliament, and then I shall go ahead."

"I didn't know you were engaged."

"No, I'm not, but I'm going to be. I can please myself, you see; I've
got lots of coin."

"Oh, yes, but can you please the lady?" asked Charlie.

"My dear boy," began Victor, "when you've seen a little more of the
world----

"Here we are," said Charlie. "Why, hullo! Who's that?"

A dripping head and a blowing mouth were visible in the middle of the
Pool.

"Willie Prime by Jove! 'Morning Willie;" and Charlie set about flinging
off his flannels, Victor following his example in a more leisurely
fashion.