“Oh he’ll come back!” I said, glancing at his place. The repast continued and when it was finished I screwed my chair round to leave the table. Mrs. Peck performed the same movement and we quitted the saloon together. Outside of it was the usual vestibule, with several seats, from which you could descend to the lower cabins or mount to the promenade-deck. Mrs. Peck appeared to hesitate as to her course and then solved the problem by going neither way. She dropped on one of the benches and looked up at me.
“I thought you said he’d come back.”
“Young Nettlepoint? Yes, I see he didn’t. Miss Mavis then has given him half her dinner.”
“It’s very kind of her! She has been engaged half her life.”
“Yes, but that will soon be over.”
“So I suppose—as quick as ever we land. Every one knows it on Merrimac Avenue,” Mrs. Peck pursued. “Every one there takes a great interest in it.”
“Ah of course—a girl like that has many friends.”
But my informant discriminated. “I mean even people who don’t know her.”
“I see,” I went on: “she’s so handsome that she attracts attention—people enter into her affairs.”
Mrs. Peck spoke as from the commanding centre of these. “She used to be pretty, but I can’t say I think she’s anything remarkable today. Anyhow, if she attracts attention she ought to be all the more careful what she does. You had better tell her that.”