She was smiling still, while the first lady laughed, if possible in a more bewildering manner than before. "Don't you know us?" She seemed to be whispering across the gulf.
He shook his head in desperation, whereupon the second lady gave orders to the men to stop hoisting the mainsail.
"If you are Mr. Durant, come on board!"
This time the voice was distinct in the silence that followed the hoisting of the sail. He knew that lady now.
And he knew the other also, though there was nothing but the turn of her head and the black accent over her eyes to remind him of Frida Tancred.
XV
"Well, is it all that you expected? Does the reality come up to the dream?"
"It does. I never knew a dream that tallied so exactly with the reality."
Frida was leaning back in a deck-chair, looking at Durant, who sat beside her on the schooner's rail.
For three days the Windward had sailed up and down the coast of Cornwall; for three days the little Torch, with all sails set, wheeled round her moorings or followed her flight. Durant had accepted Miss Tancred's invitation to join them in a week's cruise in English waters. He spent his mornings in his own yacht, his afternoons and evenings on board the schooner. The proposal had been a godsend to him in his state of indecision. After his aimless wanderings he was exhilarated by this eager challenge and pursuit, absurdly pitting the speed of his own small craft against the swiftness and strength of the larger vessel. But he enjoyed still more sitting on the rail of the Windward and talking to Frida. There was something infinitely soothing in the society of a woman who knew nothing and cared nothing about his fame. He was not the only guest. Besides Miss Chatterton there was Mr. Manby, a little middle-aged gentleman, who called himself an artist; Miss Manby, a little middle-aged woman, who seemed to be his sister; and two little girls with their hair down their backs, his daughters, Eileen and Ermyntrude Manby. Durant was a good deal alone with Frida, for a stiff breeze had kept the artist and his sister much below, and Georgie and the little girls hardly counted.