or two out I found that Miss Derwent was the object of special interest; she and her father had been the guests of no less a personage than Trafford Romaine, and it was reported that the great man had offered her marriage!  Who started the rumour I don’t know, but it is quite true that Romaine did propose to her—­and was refused!  I am assured of it by a friend of theirs on board, Mr. Arnold Jacks, an intimate friend of Romaine; but he declared that he did not start the story, and was surprised to find it known.  Miss Derwent herself?  No, my dear cynical mamma!  She isn’t that sort.  She likes me as much as I like her, I think, but in all our talk not a word from her about the great topic of curiosity.  It is just possible, I fear, that she means to marry Mr. Arnold Jacks, who, by the bye, is a son of a Member of Parliament, and rather an interesting man, but, I am quite sure, not the man for her.  If she will come down into Hampshire with me may I bring her?  It would so rejoice your dear soul to be assured that I have made such a friend, after what you are pleased to call my riff-raff foreign intimacies.”

A few words more of affectionate banter, and she signed herself “Helen M. Borisoff.”

As she was addressing the envelope, the sound of a book thrown on to the table just in front of her caused her to look up, and she saw Irene Derwent.

“What’s the matter?  Why are you damaging the ship’s literature?” she asked gaily.

“No, I can’t stand that!” exclaimed Irene.  “It’s too imbecile.  It really is what our slangy friend calls ‘rot,’ and very dry rot.  Have you read the thing?”

Mrs. Borisoff looked at the title, and answered with a headshake.

“Imagine!  An awful apparatus of mystery; blood-curdling hints about the hero, whose prospects in life are supposed to be utterly blighted.  And all because—­what do you think?  Because his father and mother forgot the marriage ceremony.”

The other was amused, and at the same time surprised.  It was the first time that Miss Derwent, in their talk, had allowed herself a remark suggestive of what is called “emancipation.”  She would talk with freedom of almost any subject save that specifically forbidden to English girls.  Helen Borisoff, whose finger showed a wedding ring, had respected this reticence, but it delighted her to see a new side of her friend’s attractive personality.

“I suppose in certain circles”—­she began.

“Oh yes!  Shopkeepers and clerks and so on.  But the book is supposed to deal with civilised people.  It really made me angry!”

Mrs. Borisoff regarded her with amused curiosity.  Their eyes met.  Irene nodded.

“Yes,” she continued, as if answering a question, “I know someone in just that position.  And all at once it struck me—­I had hardly thought of it before—­what an idiot I should be if I let it affect my feelings or behaviour!”

“I think no one would have suspected you of such narrowness.”