"To the English yacht!" he cried.
He looked at his watch. "It seems," he said to himself "that one can join the criminal classes in about six minutes. I've twenty-four the start of Phelim."
They came alongside the Tara, and the earl sprang up the ladder.
"Lady Nora?" he asked of the quartermaster.
"She is below, my lord. She has just come aboard, and she left orders to show you down, my lord."
"Me?" exclaimed the earl.
"She didn't name you, my lord;" said the quartermaster, "what she said was—'A gentleman will come on board soon; show him below.'"
The earl speculated a moment as to whether he were still a gentleman, and then went down the companion-way. He came to the saloon. The door was open. He looked in. Lady Nora was seated at the piano, but her hands were clasped in her lap. Her head was bent and the earl noticed, for the thousandth time, how the hair clustered in her neck and framed the little, close-set ear. He saw the pure outlines of her shoulders; beneath the bench, he saw her foot in its white shoe; he saw, or felt, he could not have told you which, that here was the one woman in all this great world. To love her was a distinction. To sin for her was a dispensation. To achieve her was a coronation.
He tapped on the door. The girl did not turn, but she put her hands on the keys quickly, as if ashamed to have them found idle.
"Ah, Phelim," she said, "you are more than prompt; you never keep one waiting," and she began to play very softly.