“Capital!” Mr. Raymond Greene repeated.  “Now we are all more or less a family party.  What did you say your line of business was, Mr. Romilly?”

“I don’t remember mentioning it,” Philip observed, “but I am a manufacturer of boots and shoes.”

Elizabeth Dalstan looked across at him a little curiously.  One might have surmised that she was in some way disappointed.

“Coming over to learn a thing or two from us, eh?” Mr. Greene went on.  “You use all our machinery, don’t you?  Well, there’s Paul Lawton on board, from Brockton.  I should think he has one of the biggest plants in Massachusetts.  I must make you acquainted with him.”

Philip frowned slightly.

“That is very kind of you, Mr. Greene,” he acknowledged, “but do you know I would very much rather not talk business with any one while I am on the steamer?  I am a little overworked and I need the rest.”

Elizabeth Dalstan looked at her vis-a-vis with some renewal of her former interest.  She saw a young man who was, without doubt, good-looking, although he certainly had an over-tired and somewhat depressed appearance.  His cheeks were colourless, and there were little dark lines under his eyes as though he suffered from sleeplessness.  He was clean-shaven and he had the sensitive mouth of an artist.  His forehead was high and exceptionally good.  His air of breeding was unmistakable.

“You do look a little fagged,” Mr. Raymond Greene observed sympathetically.  “Well, these are strenuous days in business.  We all have to stretch out as far as we can go, and keep stretched out, or else some one else will get ahead of us.  Business been good with you this fall, Mr. Romilly?”

“Very fair, thank you,” Philip answered a little vaguely.  “Tell me, Miss Dalstan,” he went on, leaning slightly towards her, and with a note of curiosity in his tone, “I want to know your candid opinion of the last act of the play I saw you in—­’Henderson’s Second Wife’?  I made up my mind that if ever I had the privilege of meeting you, I would ask you that question.”

“I know exactly why,” she declared, with a quick little nod of appreciation.  “Listen.”

They talked together for some time, earnestly.  Mr. Greene addressed his conversation to his neighbours lower down the table.  It was not until the arrival of dessert that Philip and his vis-a-vis abandoned their discussion.

“Tell me, have you written yourself, Mr. Romilly?” Elizabeth Dalstan asked him with interest.

“I have made an attempt at it,” he confessed.

“Most difficult thing in the whole world to write a play,” Mr. Raymond Greene intervened, seeing an opportunity to join once more in the conversation.  “Most difficult thing in the world, I should say.  Now with pictures it’s entirely different.  The slightest little happening in everyday life may give you the start, and then, there you are—­the whole thing unravels itself.  Now let me give