‘What had Lady Monson to say to your father’s misgivings?’ I inquired.
‘She accepted him, and insisted upon marrying him. He was wonderfully fond of her, Mr. Monson.’
‘And she?’
I saw her give her head a little shake, but she made no reply. Perhaps she considered that this trip we had started on sufficiently answered the question. She said, after a brief pause, ‘I myself thought my father a great deal too critical in his estimate of Sir Wilfrid. No one talked more delightfully than your cousin. He was a favourite with everybody whom he met at Melbourne. He was fresh from his travels, and was full of entertaining stories and shrewd observations; and then, again, he had much to say about European capitals, of English university life, of English Society—you will not need me to tell you that we Colonials have little weaknesses in regard to lords and ladies and to the doings of high life, from which people in England are quite exempt, and for the having which I fear we are slightly sneered at and a good deal wondered at.’
I caught the sparkle of her lifted eye.
‘And pray, Miss Jennings,’ said I, ‘what would your papa think if he were to know that you had embarked on what, I must still take the liberty of calling, a very queer voyage?’
‘Oh,’ she cried quickly and almost hysterically, ‘don’t ask me what he would think of what I am doing! What will be his thoughts when he gets the news of what Henrietta has done?’
She turned her head away from me, and kept it averted long enough to make me suspect that there was a tear in her eye. It was then that a sailor forward struck the forecastle bell four times.
‘Ten o’clock!’ she exclaimed, knowing as an ocean traveller how to interpret sea time. ‘Good-night, Mr. Monson.’
I handed her down the companion-steps, and went to my own cabin, and was presently in my bunk. But it was after seven bells, half-past eleven, before I fell asleep.