'Mary,' she said, but without any great interest, 'isn't that Lieutenant
King standing by that farthest tree?'
The eldest sister also peered through the obscurity.
'Well, yes, it is. What an extraordinary thing! Oh, I remember, he said he was going abroad. But what a curious coincidence! Why don't you go and speak to him, Nan?'
'Why should I go and speak to him?' said Nan. 'I should only get wet.'
'What can have brought him here?' said Edith.
'Not his ship, at all events,' said Mary Beresford, smartly. 'It's only
Shakspeare who can create seaports inland.'
'You ought to know better than that,' said Nan with some asperity, for she was very valiant in protecting her intellectual heroes against the attacks of a flippant criticism. 'You ought to know that at one time the Kingdom of Bohemia had seaports on the Adriatic; every school-girl knows that nowadays.'
'They didn't when I was at school,' said Mary Beresford. 'But aren't you going to speak to Lieutenant King, Nan?'
'Oh, he won't want to be bothered with a lot of girls,' said Nan; and she refused to stir.
A few seconds thereafter, though there was still an occasional flash of lightning, the rain slackened somewhat; and the young Lieutenant—who was clad in a travelling-suit of gray, by-the-way, and looked remarkably like the other young Englishmen loitering about the front of the hotel—emerged from his shelter, shook the rain-drops from his sleeves, and passed on into the dark.