She had decided already that she very much liked this strange, wistful, rather fine-drawn young man. He was quite different from any other young man she had ever met. Somehow, he was exactly like his book.
"It is odd you should have been on the same ship as my brother."
"Yes," said the Sailor. "And yet it isn't. Nothing is really queer if you come to think about it. It seems very much more strange to me that I should be in this beautiful room talking to you ladies, than that I should have been in the port watch with Klondyke aboard the Margaret Carey."
"The sea is more familiar to you than London," said Silvia, completely disarmed by his naïveté, as Mary had been.
Otto now came in. His general aspect was not unlike Klondyke's, his air was frank and manly, yet his bearing was more considered than that hero's. All the same he had a full share of the family charm.
"Otto," said Mary, "this is Mr. Harper, who knows Jack."
"What, you know old Fly-up-the-Creek! Heaven help you!"
Mr. Harper had already made the discovery that these people had a language of their own, which he could only follow with difficulty. It was a language which Madame Sadleir didn't teach, a language that Mr. Ambrose didn't use, although he understood it well enough; in fact, it was a language he had never heard before, and he somehow felt that Lady Pridmore was rather pained by it.
"Mr. Harper," said Mary, "this is our respectable brother. He is true to type."
"For the love of heaven, be quiet!" said Otto, gulping his tea.