'Oh no; my travelling experiences are very limited. But to read of a shipwreck is bad enough.'
'We have had a most delightful voyage so far. Quite like summer. One can scarcely believe that we left America in the depth of winter, with snow everywhere and the thermometer ever so far below zero. Have you mended your deck-chair yet, sufficiently well to trust yourself upon it again?'
'Oh!' said Kenyon, with a laugh, 'you really must not make fun of my amateur carpentering like that. As I told you, I am a mining engineer, and if I cannot mend a deck-chair, what would you expect me to do with a mine?'
'Have you had much to do with mines?' asked the young woman.
'I am just beginning,' replied Kenyon; 'this, in fact, is one of my first commissions. I have been sent with my friend Wentworth to examine certain mines on the Ottawa River.'
'The Ottawa River!' cried Edith. 'Are you one of those who were sent out by the London Syndicate?'
'Yes,' answered Kenyon with astonishment. 'What do you know about it?'
'Oh, I know everything about it. Everything, except what the mining expert's report is to be, and that information, I suppose, you have; so, between the two of us, we know a great deal about the fortunes of the London Syndicate.'
'Really! I am astonished to meet a young lady who knows anything about the matter. I understood it was rather a secret combination up to the present.'
'Ah! but, you see, I am one of the syndicate.'