"Going what?"
"Yachting. I said yachting. Do you want me to shout? We are leaving here to-day; we are starting on the Sea Bird to-morrow for wherever Captain Slocock likes to take us; you and I alone together."
"Are we?"
"Yes, we are. Is that the dying-duck-in-a-thunderstorm sort of fashion in which you take my surprising piece of information? Move some of those bedclothes and let me see your face, or, if you won't, I will."
Her ladyship did. It was a white, wan face which looked out at her from between the sheets, so white and so wan that her ladyship was quite startled.
"Vi, what do you mean by telling me you're all right? You look like a ghost."
"I wish I were."
"What does the child mean! Whatever for?"
"If I were a ghost I should be dead."
"I see, that's it; and a good, sound, healthy idea, especially for a young woman who is scarcely more than a child."