"Mr. Harland gave orders to the steward to make them as pretty as he could,"—said the maid—"John" and she blushed—"has a lot of taste."
I smiled. I saw at once how matters were between her and "John." Just then there was a sound of thudding and grinding above my head, and I realised that we were beginning to weigh anchor. Quickly tying on my yachting cap and veil, I hurried on deck, and was soon standing beside my host, who seemed pleased at the alacrity with which I had joined him, and I watched with feelings of indescribable exhilaration the 'Diana' being loosed from her moorings. Steam was up, and in a very short time her bowsprit swung round and pointed outward from the bay. Quivering like an eager race-horse ready to start, she sprang forward; and then, with a stately sweeping curve, glided across the water, catting it into bright wavelets with her sword-like keel and churning a path behind her of opalescent foam. We were off on our voyage of pleasure at last,—a voyage which the Fates had determined should, for one adventurer at least, lead to strange regions as yet unexplored. But no premonitory sign was given to me, or suggestion that I might be the one chosen to sail 'the perilous seas of fairy lands forlorn'—for in spiritual things of high import, the soul that is most concerned is always the least expectant.
II
THE FAIRY SHIP
I was introduced that evening at dinner to Mr. Harland's physician, and also to his private secretary. I was not greatly prepossessed in favour of either of these gentlemen. Dr. Brayle was a dark, slim, clean-shaven man of middle age with expressionless brown eyes and sleek black hair which was carefully brushed and parted down the middle,—he was quiet and self-contained in manner, and yet I thought I could see that he was fully alive to the advantages of his position as travelling medical adviser to an American millionaire. I have not mentioned till now that Morton Harland was an American. I was always rather in the habit of forgetting the fact, as he had long ago forsworn his nationality and had naturalised himself as a British subject. But he had made his vast fortune in America, and was still the controlling magnate of many large financial interests in the States. He was, however, much more English than American, for he had been educated at Oxford, and as a young man had been always associated with English society and English ways. He had married an English wife, who died when their first child, his daughter, was born, and he was wont to set down all Miss Catherine's mopish languors to a delicacy inherited from her mother, and to lack of a mother's care in childhood. In my opinion Catherine was robust enough, but it was evident that from a very early age she had been given her own way to the fullest extent, and had been so accustomed to have every little ailment exaggerated and made the most of that she had grown to believe health of body and mind as well-nigh impossible to the human being. Dr. Brayle, I soon perceived, lent himself to this attitude, and I did not like the covert gleam of his mahogany-coloured eyes as he glanced rapidly from father to daughter in the pauses of conversation, watching them as narrowly as a cat might watch a couple of unwary mice. The secretary, Mr. Swinton, was a pale, precise-looking young man with a somewhat servile demeanour, under which he concealed an inordinately good opinion of himself. His ideas were centred in and bounded by the art of stenography,—he was an adept in shorthand and typewriting, could jot down, I forget how many crowds of jostling words a minute, and never made a mistake. He was a clock-work model of punctuality and dispatch, of respectfulness and obedience,—but he was no more than a machine,—he could not be moved to a spontaneous utterance or a spontaneous smile, unless both smile and utterance were the result of some pleasantness affecting himself. Neither Dr. Brayle nor Mr. Swinton were men whom one could positively like or dislike,—they simply had the power of creating an atmosphere in which my spirit found itself swimming like a gold-fish in a bowl, wondering how it got in and how it could get out.
As I sat rather silently at table I felt, rather than saw, Dr. Brayle regarding me with a kind of perplexed curiosity. I was as fully aware of his sensations as of my own,—I knew that my presence irritated him, though he was not clever enough to explain even to himself the cause of his irritation. So far as Mr. Swinton was concerned, he was comfortably wrapped up in a pachydermatous hide of self-appreciation, so that he thought nothing about me one way or the other except as a guest of his patrons, and one therefore to whom he was bound to be civil. But with Dr. Brayle it was otherwise. I was a puzzle to him, and—after a brief study of me—an annoyance. He forced himself into conversation with me, however, and we interchanged a few remarks on the weather and on the various beauties of the coast along which we had been sailing all day.
"I see that you care very much for fine scenery," he said—"Few women do."
"Really?" And I smiled. "Is admiration of the beautiful a special privilege of men only?"
"It should be,"—he answered, with a little bow—"We are the admirers of your sex."
I made no answer. Mr. Harland looked at me with a somewhat quizzical air.