"But Ingerson!" I protested.
"I know. Ingerson is a brute, you would say; and so would I, if I were on the witness stand and obliged to testify. But in condemning him we should be in the minority, Dick. He has the entrée to the best houses in New York, and half of the dowagers in that abandoned city would snap at him for a son-in-law."
"That may well be. But to shut yourself up with him in a yacht party for weeks on end——"
"Your point is well taken. But you will remember that I have admitted the madnesses from start to finish. The vital thing, however, is this: Will you consent to go along with us to add the saving touch of sanity? Don't turn me down, Dick," he added, and the adjuration was almost a pleading.
"I'm not turning you down," I hastened to say. "I am merely asking 'why?'"
Van Dyck's face was a study in moody perplexity, and he spoke slowly, almost hesitantly, when he answered my query.
"I don't know that I can explain the exact 'why,' or give a logical reason, even to so good a friend as you are, Dick. The winter-cruise notion originated with Mrs. Van Tromp, I believe; and she is responsible for the inclusion of the major and his nephew. Also, she is the one who asked me to invite Ingerson. She has been playing in hard luck lately, and for the sake of her three girls, who, in her point of view, have simply got to marry money, she is obliged to keep the pace. I suppose the prospect of a winter in Florida—the four of them at Palm Beach, with no chance to cut economical corners, you know—appalled her. Besides, she knows the Andromeda, and the Andromeda's chef. That goes a long way with as good a trencherwoman as she is."
"That will do for a starter," I said. "Let us say that Mrs. Van Tromp and her daughters are bread-and-butter guests. But how about the others?"
Van Dyck did not reply until after the deft serving man had cleared the table and brought the cigars.