"Glorious! Glorious! Glorious!" she laughed. "But I will— never give you my lips!"
All defiance and no mischief, the man's laugh answered the challenge.
"I sha'n't—care what—you give me," he said, "when I'm once fixed so that I can take what I want!"
With a swish of keel and sand the little launch landed at their feet.
The nattily uniformed sailor who manned the launch was too well trained in his master's service to show a flicker of surprise or curiosity concerning his master's errands. But a master's weakness being only too often the man's, the only blunder of his ten years service slipped now from his faintly alcoholic lips.
"Good evening, Dighton!" nodded his master.
"Good evening, sir!" saluted the man with punctilious formality. 175
"Here, fix those cushions a little better!" pointed his master as he helped the vague white figure into the boat. "Here, Dighton, give the lady a hand!"
Lifting his eyes for the first time to the little lady's laughing face peering out half-affrighted from her bright disheveled hair, Dighton the man gave a purely involuntary gasp, and stumbled a bit clumsily over some shadowy obstacle.
"That's all right, Dighton," laughed his master. "She's got the looks to knock most any man over! Your new Mistress, Dighton!" he called out proudly.