The baronet could not fail to note the manner in which these two addressed each other, the fearless love which leaped from eye to eye, the calm acceptance of a relationship not be questioned or gainsaid.  Robert and Iris, without spoken word on the subject, had tactily agreed to avoid the slightest semblance of subterfuge as unworthy alike of their achievements and their love.  Yet what could Sir Arthur Deane do?  To frame a suitable protest at such a moment was not to be dreamed of.  As yet he was too shaken to collect his thoughts.  Anstruther’s proposal, however, helped him to blurt out what he intuitively felt to be a disagreeable fact.  Yet something must be said, for his brain reeled.

“Your suggestion is admirable,” he cried, striving desperately to affect a careless complaisance.  “The ship’s stores may provide Iris with some sort of rig-out, and an old friend of hers is on board at this moment, little expecting her presence.  Lord Ventnor has accompanied me in my search.  He will, of course, be delighted—­”

Anstruther flushed a deep bronze, but Iris broke in—­

“Father, why did he come with you?”

Sir Arthur, driven into this sudden squall of explanation, became dignified.

“Well, you see, my dear, under the circumstances, he felt an anxiety almost commensurate with my own.”

“But why, why?”

Iris was quite calm.  With Robert near, she was courageous.  Even the perturbed baronet experienced a new sensation as his troubled glance fell before her searching eyes.  His daughter had left him a joyous, heedless girl.  He found her a woman, strong, self-reliant, purposeful.  Yet he kept on, choosing the most straightforward means as the only honorable way of clearing a course so beset with unsuspected obstacles.

“It is only reasonable, Iris, that your affianced husband should suffer an agony of apprehension on your account, and do all that was possible to effect your rescue.”

“My—­affianced—­husband?”

“Well, my dear girl, perhaps that is hardly the correct phrase from your point of view.  Yet you cannot fail to remember that Lord Ventnor—­”

“Father, dear,” said Iris solemnly, but in a voice free from all uncertainty, “my affianced husband stands here!  We plighted our troth at the very gate of death.  It was ratified in the presence of God, and has been blessed by Him.  I have made no compact with Lord Ventnor.  He is a base and unworthy man.  Did you but know the truth concerning him you would not mention his name in the same breath with mine.  Would he, Robert?”

Never was man so perplexed as the unfortunate shipowner.  In the instant that his beloved daughter was restored to him out of the very depths of the sea, he was asked either to undertake the role of a disappointed and unforgiving parent, or sanction her marriage to a truculent-looking person of most forbidding if otherwise manly appearance, who had certainly saved her from death in ways not presently clear to him, but who could not be regarded as a suitable son-in-law solely on that account.