"I'm afraid," she went on, scrutinising me dispassionately after the manner of the modern young girl, "that you're in for a very slow time. There's nobody but just Daddy and me. Of course, that was the idea of this cruise. Daddy overworked terribly in the war and the doctors told him he'd never get his nerves right unless he dropped business absolutely for a whole year."
I wondered how she had divined the nature of my mission to her father. Perhaps the captain had jumped to conclusions and had imparted them to her. But her next remark puzzled me horribly.
"Of course, I'm perfectly fit," she observed, and smiled with a glint of white teeth. "But Daddy is very difficult to handle. He has cables sent to him at every port, and when we're in harbour his cabin looks like his office at the Manchester Cotton Exchange. You'll have to be very severe with him about it...."
"I don't know really," I replied, very puzzled, "whether I should feel justified...."
"Oh," laughed the girl, "that's no way to handle Daddy. He's from the North, remember! He made his money by knowing when to say 'No'; at least, that's what he says. And you'll have to say 'No' to him. And to me, as well. I'm like Daddy. I adore having my own way. And I usually get it...."
"That I'm fully prepared to believe!" I answered, and we both laughed. It was as though we were old friends. Then, growing serious on a sudden, the girl very deliberately started rolling up the left sleeve of her blouse. I gazed at her in bewilderment. What was coming now? I asked myself. With the utmost composure she unbared to the shoulder a firm, round and very white arm.
"Don't give me away to Daddy," she observed confidentially. "But my idiotic French maid burnt my arm the day before yesterday with the electric tongs and it's rather sore. I wish you would just have a look at it. I haven't said a word to Daddy, for, if he knew, he would insist on dismissing Yvonne. Would you mind....?"
She extended her left arm to me whilst I, like an idiot, blushed furiously in my embarrassment and vainly cudgelled my brains to discover who this charming girl thought I was. And why the devil should I look at the burn on her arm?
A calm voice at the doorway delivered me from my dilemma.
"Sir Alexander will see you, sir!"