"Then it's the 'sort' you love?" she asked.
"Yes, if you'll allow me. Not the individual—as yet. When I love the individual I hope it'll be the right sort, but I'm so humbly unlucky I'll probably make a mistake."
For the first time since their acquaintance Madeline found the big boy interesting. She knew very little of the history of the Kanes and Cumberfords, but found Chesty eager to speak of them and of his past relations with them, being loud in his praise for the entire "combination." Cumberford was an eccentric fellow, according to Mr. Radley-Todd, but "straight as a die." Steve was chock full of ability and talent, but not very practical in business ways. Mrs. Kane, Orissa's blind mother, was the sweetest and gentlest lady in the world, Sybil Cumberford a delightful mystery that defied fathoming but constantly allured one to the attempt, while Orissa——
"Orissa Kane is a girl you'll have to read yourself, Miss Dentry, and the more you study her the better you'll love her. She's girl all over, and the kind of girl one always hopes to meet but seldom does. Old-fashioned in her gentleness, simplicity, truth and candor; up-to-the-minute in the world's latest discovery—the art of flying. Modest as Tennyson's dairymaid; brave as a trooper; a maid with a true maid's heart and a thorough sport when you give her an aëroplane to manage. Excuse me. I don't often talk this way; usually I can only express myself in writing. But a fellow who wouldn't enthuse over Orissa Kane could only have one excuse—total dumbness."
"I see," said Madeline, slyly. "Miss Kane is the type of the 'sort' of girl you love."
"Exactly. But tell me, since you've started on such an indefinite cruise, is the Salvador well provisioned?"
"From the sublime to the ridiculous! We have stores to last our party six weeks, without scrimping."
"Good. And coal?"
"Enough for a month's continuous run. I had intended a trip to Honolulu—perhaps as far as Japan—and had prepared for it even before I was privileged to lay eyes on my yacht."
"How fortunate that was, for all of us! Somehow, I've a feeling we shall find those girls, this time. Before, I had a sort of hunch we were destined to fail. Can you explain that?"