“I will attend to the lady, sir, thanking you kindly for the service you have already rendered her,” he said, somewhat haughtily, and offering Miss Douglas his own arm.
She took it, and with a grateful little bow to the strange gentleman, and one more rapid glance into his fine eyes, she allowed Mr. Coolidge to lead her away.
“Who was that gentleman, Miss Douglas?” Wilbur Coolidge demanded, with a grave face, when they had left him, and he was carefully conducting her down the companionway.
“I do not know; I have never met him before, and yet——” was Brownie’s hesitating reply, while her face wore a puzzled look.
“And yet what?” asked the young man, trying to speak carelessly, yet with the vestige of a frown.
“It seems to me as if I have seen his face at some time, but where, I do not remember.” And the perplexed look still remained upon her countenance.
“He seemed to know you. He called you ‘Brownie Douglas.’ Is that your name?”
The color flamed again into her cheeks at the question. She had noticed the stranger’s involuntary utterance of her pet name, and had been strangely moved by it.
“It used to be when I had dear friends.”
She grew sad and pale again at the memories which came thronging upon her at the sound of the dear old name.