"We may see you in New York, Sir George?" said Miss Pierways. "Really? How strange that will seem! I've been eager to go to New York all my life; but now that I'm going, I'm rather afraid. The idea of a great city where I haven't any friends——"
"But you will have many friends, Agnes."
"By-and-by," answered Miss Pierways. "Yes, I suppose so. But it's very fatiguing making friends, don't you think so? And I tremble at the voyage."
"How delightful it would be," remarked Mrs. Van Buren, "if we were going by the same steamer, Sir George!"
Heriot laughed.
"It would be very delightful to me to make the voyage in your company. But I might bore you frightfully; a week at sea must be a severe test. I should be afraid of being found out."
"We are promised other passengers," observed Miss Pierways, looking down with a faint smile. Her archness was a shade stiff, but her neck was one of her chief attractions.
"Why don't you go, George?" said Lady Heriot cheerfully. "You'd much better go by Mrs. Van Buren's boat than any other; and you've been talking of making a trip to America 'next year' ever since I've known you!"
This amiable fiction was succeeded by fresh protestations from Mrs. Van Buren that no arrangement could be more charming, and Heriot, half against his will, half with pleasure, found himself agreeing to telegraph in the morning to inquire if he could obtain a berth.
He hardly knew whether he was sorry or glad when he had done so. That the step would result in an engagement might be predicted with a tolerable degree of certainty, and he would have preferred to arrive at an understanding with himself under conditions which savoured less of coercion.