The Princess appeared for luncheon and declared herself to be in a
remarkably good humour.
"My dear Cecil," she said, helping herself to an ortolan in aspic, "I
like your climate and I like your chef. I had my window open for at
least ten minutes, and the sea air has given me quite an appetite. I
have serious thoughts of embracing the simple life."
"You could scarcely," Cecil de la Borne answered, "come to a better
place for your first essay. I will guarantee that life is sufficiently
simple here for any one. I have no neighbours, no society to offer you,
no distractions of any sort. Still, I warned you before you came."
"Don't be absurd," the Princess declared. "You have the sea almost at
your front door, and I adore the sea. If you have a nice large boat I
should like to go for a sail."
Cecil looked at her with upraised eyebrows.
"If you are serious," he said, "no doubt we can find the boat."
"I am absolutely serious," the Princess declared. "I feel that this is
exactly what my system required. I should like to sit in a comfortable
cushioned seat and sail somewhere. If possible, I should like you men
to catch things from the side of the boat."
"You will get sunburnt," Lord Ronald remarked drily; "perhaps even
freckled."
"Adorable!" the Princess declared. "A touch of sunburn would be quite
becoming. It is such an excellent foundation to build a complexion
upon. Jeanne is quite enchanted with the place. She's had adventures
already, and been rescued from drowning by a marvellous person, who
wore his trousers tucked into his boots and found fault with her shoes
and stockings. She has promised to show me the place after luncheon,
and I am going to stand there myself and see if anything happens."
"You will get your feet very wet," Cecil declared.
"And sand inside your shoes," Forrest remarked.
"These," the Princess declared, "are trifles compared with the
delightful sensation of experiencing a real adventure. In any case we
must sail one afternoon, Cecil. I insist upon it. We will not play
bridge until after dinner. My luck last night was abominable. Oh, you
needn't look at me like that," she added to Cecil. "I know I won, but
that was an accident. I had bad cards all the time, and I only won
because you others had worse. Please ring the bell, Mr. Host, and see
about the boat."
"Really," Cecil remarked, as he called the butler and gave him some
instructions, "I had no idea that I was going to entertain such
enterprising guests."
"Oh, there are lots of things I mean to do!" the Princess declared. "I
am seriously thinking of going shrimping. I suppose there are shrimps
here, and I should love to tuck up my skirts and carry a big net, like
somebody's picture."
"Perhaps," Cecil suggested, "you would like to try the golf links. I
believe there are some quite decent ones not far away."
The Princess shook her head.
"No!" she answered. "Golf is too civilized a game. We will go out in a
fishing boat with plenty of cushions, and we will try to catch fish. I
know that Jeanne will love it, and that you others will hate it.
Between the two of you it should be amusing."
"Very well," Cecil declared, with an air of resignation, "whatever
happens will be upon your own shoulders. There is a boat in the village
which we can have. I will have it brought up to our own quay in an
hour's time. If the worst comes to the worst, and we are bored to
death, we can play bridge on the way."
"There will be no cards upon the boat," the Princess declared
decidedly. "I forbid them. We are going to lounge and look at the sea
and get sunburnt. Jeanne can wear a veil if she likes. I shall not."
Cecil shrugged his shoulders.
"Very well," he said. "Whatever happens, don't blame me."
* * * * *
The Princess had her way and behaved like a schoolgirl. She sat in the
most comfortable place, surrounded with a multitude of cushions, with
her tiny Japanese spaniel in her arms, and a box of French bonbons by
her side. Jeanne stood in the bows, bareheaded and happy. Lord Ronald,
who was feeling a little sea-sick, sat at her feet.
"I had no idea," he remarked plaintively, "that your mother was capable
of such crudities. If I had known, I certainly would not have trusted
myself to such a party. This sea air is hateful. It has tarnished my
cigarette-case already, and one's nails will not be fit to be seen. To
be out of doors like this is worse than drinking unfiltered water."
Jeanne smiled down at him a little contemptuously.
"You are a child of the cities, Lord Ronald," she remarked. "Next year
I am going to buy a yacht myself, but I shall not ask you to come with
us."
Lord Ronald groaned.
"That is the worst of all heiresses," he said. "You have such queer
tastes. I shall never summon up my courage to propose to you."
"There is always leap year," Jeanne reminded him.
"What a bewildering suggestion!" he murmured, looking uncomfortably
over the side of the boat. "I say, Forrest, what do you think of this
sort of thing?"
"Idyllic!" Forrest declared cynically. "To sit upon a hard plank and to
have one's digestion unmercifully interfered with like this is
unqualified rapture. If only there were cabins one might sleep."
"There will be cabins on my yacht," Jeanne declared laughing, "but I
shall not ask either of you. You are both of you knights of the candle
light. I shall get some great strong fisherman to be captain, and I
shall go round the world and forget the days and the months."
Forrest shivered slightly.
"The country," he remarked to the Princess, "is having a terrible
effect upon your stepdaughter."
The Princess nodded and thrust a bonbon into the languid jaws of the
dog she was holding.
"It is my fault," she declared. "It is I who have set this fashion. It
was a whim, and I am tired of it. Tell our host that we will go back."
They tacked a few minutes later, and swept shoreward. Jeanne, still
standing in the bows, was gazing steadfastly upon the little island at
the entrance of the estuary.
"I should like," she declared, pointing it out to Cecil, "to land there
and have some tea."
Cecil looked at her doubtfully.
"We shall be home in a little more than an hour," he said, "and I don't
suppose we could get any tea there, even if we were able to land."
"I have a conviction that we should," Jeanne declared. "Mother," she
added, turning round to the older woman, "there is an island just ahead
of us with a delightful looking cottage. I believe my preserver of this
morning lives there. Wouldn't it be lovely to go and beg him to give us
all tea?"
"Charming!" the Princess declared, sitting up amongst her cushions. "I
should love to see him, and tea is the one thing in the world I want to
make me happy."
Cecil de la Borne stood silent for a moment or two, looking steadfastly
at the whitewashed cottage upon the island. It seemed impossible, after
all, to escape from Andrew!
"The man lives there alone, I believe," he said. "I don't suppose there
is any one to get us tea. He would only be embarrassed by our coming,
and not know what to do."
Jeanne smiled reflectively.
"I do not think," she said, "that it would be easy to embarrass Mr.
Andrew. However, if you like we will put it off to another afternoon,
on one condition."
"Let me hear the condition at any rate," Cecil asked.
"That we go straight back, and that you show us that subterranean
passage," Jeanne declared.
"Agreed!" Cecil answered. "I warn you that you will find it only damp
and mouldy and depressing, but you shall certainly see it."
The girl moved toward the side of the boat, and stood leaning over,
with her eyes fixed upon the island. Standing on the small grass plot
in front of the cottage she could see the tall figure of a man with his
face turned toward them. A faint smile parted her lips as she watched.
She took out her handkerchief and waved it. The man for a moment stood
motionless, and then raising his cap, held it for a moment above his
head. The boat sped on, and very soon they were out of sight. She stood
there, however, watching, until they had rounded the sandy spit and
entered the creek which led into the harbour. There was something
unusually piquant to her in the thought of that greeting with the man,
whose response to it had been so unwilling, almost ungracious.