He liked the Ravenhills very well, but he had not intended to attach himself to any fellow-travellers, and when he spoke of jogging along together, it was rather an allusion to the inevitable gravitation of Norwegian travel than to that deliberate companionship which their words seemed to accept. He told himself, however, that this was a natural mistake, born of inexperience. It would be easy enough to break away when he found it desirable; he would not worry his holiday with excess of caution. Mrs Ravenhill was charming, and Millie might turn out to possess the same delicate quality. As she stood before him with her mother, he was struck with the prettiness of her hazel eyes and her dimples, and with that swift rush of thought into the imaginary future which we have all experienced, and from which we often return with a flush of shame, he saw himself falling in love with Millie, and coming back to England an engaged man. The thought was so vivid, that when at this moment she turned to speak to him, he had scarcely time to call himself back to the actual condition of things, and something of his mental picture was perhaps betrayed in his face, for she glanced quickly at him a second time, and coloured slightly.
“Norway may be as delightful as you all declare,” she said, “but when I set up a delightful land it shall have no custom-house. Here we shall have to wait, I suppose, while great big men amuse themselves with rummaging among all my most nicely packed corners. Oh, it’s absurd, it’s barbarous! And mother wouldn’t bring a maid.”
Mrs Ravenhill had moved a little forward, to speak to one of the stewards who were carrying up the cabin packages. When next Wareham looked at her, she had apparently relinquished her intention, and was talking to a gentleman who up to this moment had stood aloof, and who, even now, showed no great conversational alacrity, as Wareham remarked with a little amusement.
“Who is that?” he asked Miss Ravenhill.
“That?” Millie’s eyes began to smile. “Oh, poor Colonel Martyn. It is really wicked of mother, for she knows how frightened he gets when he hasn’t Mrs Martyn to protect him. But here she comes,” and Millie stopped suddenly.
Wareham did not notice the break, for his eyes had passed Mrs Martyn, and fallen with a start of annoyed surprise upon the face of a girl who followed her. The girl was young, and unusually tall, though, owing to an extraordinary grace and ease of movement, this only became evident when you compared her with the other women who stood round. She looked neither to the right nor left, and with the sun shining brightly behind her, it was difficult to see her face distinctly, but Millie, who was watching Wareham, perceived that he recognised her, and that the recognition was, for some reason or other, unwelcome.
“You know Miss Dalrymple?” she asked curiously.
Wareham’s expression had stiffened.
“No,” he said briefly.
“No? But you have seen her? You must have seen her this season?”