Edith smiled upon him pleasantly, and answered:
'Mr. Kenyon you mean, I suppose?'
'Oh, you know his name, do you?' he answered gruffly.
'Certainly,' she replied; 'I would not walk with a gentleman whose name I did not know.'
'Really?' sneered her cousin. 'And pray were you introduced to him?'
'I do not think,' answered Edith quietly, 'any person has a right to ask me that question except my father. He has not asked it, and, as you have, I will merely answer that I was introduced to Mr. Kenyon.'
'I did not know you had any mutual acquaintance on board who could make you known to each other.'
'Well, the ceremony was a little informal. We were introduced by our mutual friend, old Father Neptune. Father Neptune, being, as you know, a little boisterous this morning, took the liberty of flinging me upon Mr. Kenyon. I weigh something more than a feather, and the result was—although Mr. Kenyon was good enough to say he was uninjured—that the chair on which he sat had not the same consideration for my feelings, and it went down with a crash. I thought Mr. Kenyon should take my chair in exchange for the one I had the misfortune to break, but Mr. Kenyon thought otherwise. He said he was a mining engineer, and that he could not claim to be a very good one if he found any difficulty in mending a deck-chair. It seems he succeeded in doing so, and that is the whole history of my introduction to, and my intercourse with, Mr. Kenyon, Mining Engineer.'
'Most interesting and romantic,' replied the young man; 'and do you think that your father approves of your picking up indiscriminate acquaintances in this way?'
Edith, flushing a little at this, said: