And now all the world was flocking to Cowes for the regatta, and Lesbia and her chaperon were established on board Mr. Smithson’s yacht, the Cayman; and the captain of the Cayman and all her crew were delivered over to Lesbia to be her slaves and to obey her lightest breath.  The Cayman was to lie at anchor off Cowes for the regatta week; and then she was to sail for Hyde, and lie at anchor there for another regatta week; and she was to be a floating-hotel for Lady Lesbia so long as the young lady would condescend to occupy her.

The captain was an altogether exceptional captain, and the crew were a picked crew, ruddy faced, sandy whiskered for the most part, Englishmen all, honest, hardy fellows from between the Nore and the Wash, talking in an honest provincial patois, dashed with sea slang.  They were the very pink and pattern of cleanliness, and the Cayman herself from stem to stern was dazzling and spotless to an almost painful degree.

Not content with the existing arrangements of the yacht, which were at once elegant and luxurious, Mr. Smithson had sent down a Bond Street upholsterer to refit the saloon and Lady Lesbia’s cabin.  The dark velvet and morocco which suited a masculine occupant would not have harmonised with girlhood and beauty; and Mr. Smithson’s saloon, as originally designed, had something of the air of a tabagie.  The Bond Street man stripped away all the velvet and morocco, plucked up the Turkey carpet, draped the scuttle-ports with pale yellow cretonne garnished with orange pompons, subdued the glare of the skylight by a blind of oriental silk, covered the divans with Persian saddlebags, the floor with a delicate Indian matting, and furnished the saloon with all that was most feminine in the way of bamboo chairs and tea-tables, Japanese screens and fans of gorgeous colouring.  Here and there against the fluted yellow drapery he fastened a large Rhodes plate; and the thing was done.  Lady Lesbia’s cabin was all bamboo and embroidered India muslin.  An oval glass, framed in Dresden biscuit, adorned the side, a large white bearskin covered the floor.  The berth was pretty enough for the cradle of a duchess’s first baby.  Even Lesbia, spoiled by much indulgence and unlimited credit, gave a little cry of pleasure at sight of the nest that had been made ready for her.

‘Really, Mr. Smithson is immensely kind!’ she exclaimed.

‘Smithson is always kind,’ answered Lady Kirkbank, ’and you don’t half enough appreciate him.  He has given me his very own cabin—­such a dear little den!  There are his cigar boxes and everything lovely on the shelves, and his own particular dressing-case put open for me to use—­all the backs of all the brushes repousse silver, and all the scent-bottles filled expressly for me.  If the yacht would only stand quite still, I should think it more delicious than the best house I ever stayed in:  only I don’t altogether enjoy that little way it has of gurgling up and down perpetually.’