He smiled reassuringly.

“That’s settled then,” he said.  “I can assure you that I feel very much more interested in the voyage already.  By the by, my name is Mildmay.”

“And mine,” she replied, after a moment’s hesitation, “is Virginia Longworth.”

“Virginia,” he repeated with a smile.  “I think that is one of the most delightful of your American names.”

“You are English, aren’t you?” she asked.

He nodded.

“I,” he said, “am returning from my first visit to the States.  I have been to stay with a cousin who has a ranch out West.  We had ever such a good time.”

She looked at his sunburnt skin, and smiled to herself.

“Did you stay in New York?” she asked.

“Only two days,” he answered.  “Somehow or other those big places are rather terrifying.  I had no friends there, and I wandered about as though I were in a wilderness.”

“What a pity!” she murmured.  “Americans are so hospitable.  Surely you could have found some friends if you had wished to!”

He smiled a little whimsically.

“Yes!” he said, “I dare say I could, but I hadn’t the time to spare to look them up.  Now tell me about your visit to England.  Where are you going to stay?  In the country or in London?”

“I am not sure,” she answered, “but I think in London, at first at any rate.”

“You have relations there, of course?” he asked.

“None,” she answered.

“Friends, then?”

She turned her dark eyes upon him.  He felt himself suddenly embarrassed.

“I am awfully sorry,” he said.  “I’ve no right to ask you all these questions.  The fact is, I was only trying to make sure that I should be able to see something of you after we had landed.”

She smiled.

“I am afraid,” she said, “that that will be scarcely possible, but, if you don’t mind, you mustn’t ask me any questions about my journey.  I will admit that it is rather a peculiar one, that I have no friends in England, that I made up my mind to come all of a sudden.  My journey has an object, of course, but I cannot tell you what it is, and you must not ask me.”

“Of course I will not,” he answered, “but I shall talk to you again about this before we land.  I mean to say that you must let me give you my card, and you will know, at any rate, that there is some one in England to whom you can send if you are in need of a friend.”

She smiled at him delightfully.

“And I have always been told,” she said, “that Englishmen were so slow!  Why, I have known you scarcely a quarter of an hour.”

“But I have watched you,” he answered, “for two days.”

“Well,” she declared, “I like impulsive people, so I dare say I’ll ask you for the card before we land.  Do you live in London?”

“I have a house there,” he answered.  “I am there for about two months in the year, and odd week-ends during the hunting season.”