Keith Redington was nearly six feet in height.  He was thin, and even bony; but he was very toughly and strongly built, and his face was as clean and brown as that of any healthy man who travels far by sea.  He was less dark than Jenny, and his hair was almost auburn, so rich a chestnut was it.  His eyes were blue and heavily lashed; his hands were long and brown, with small freckles between the knuckles.  He stood with incomparable ease, his hands and arms always ready, but in perfect repose.  His lips, for he was clean-shaven, were keen and firm.  His glance was fearless.  As the phrase is, he looked every inch a sailor, born to challenge the winds and the waters.  To Jenny, who knew only those men who show at once what they think or feel, his greater breeding made Keith appear inscrutable, as if he had belonged to a superior race.  She could only smile at him, with parted lips, not at all the baffling lady of the mirror, or the contemptuous younger sister, or the daring franctireur of her little home at Kennington Park.  Jenny Blanchard she remained, but the simple, eager Jenny to whom these other Jennies were but imperious moods.

“Well, I’ve come,” she said.  “But you needn’t have been so sure.”

Keith gave an irrepressible grin.  He motioned her to the table, shaking his head at her tone.

“Come and have some grub,” he said cheerfully.  “I was about as sure as you were.  You needn’t worry about that, old sport.  There’s so little time.  Come and sit down; there’s a good girl.  And presently I’ll tell you all about it.”  He looked so charming as he spoke that Jenny obediently smiled in return, and the light came rushing into her eyes, chasing away the shadows, so that she felt for that time immeasurably happy and unsuspicious.  She sat down at the laden table, smiling again at the marvels which it carried.

“My word, what a feast!” she said helplessly.  “Talk about the Ritz!”

Keith busied himself with the dishes.  The softly glowing cabin threw over Jenny its spell; the comfort, the faint slow rocking of the yacht, the sense of enclosed solitude, lulled her.  Every small detail of ease, which might have made her nervous, merged with the others in a marvellous contentment because she was with Keith, cut off from the world, happy and at peace.  If she sighed, it was because her heart was full.  But she had forgotten the rest of the evening, her shabbiness, every care that troubled her normal days.  She had cast these things off for the time and was in a glow of pleasure.  She smiled at Keith with a sudden mischievousness.  They both smiled, without guilt, and without guile, like two children at a reconciliation.

vi

“Soup?” said Keith, and laid before her a steaming plate.  “All done by kindness.”

“Have you been cooking?” Some impulse made Jenny motherly.  It seemed a strange reversal of the true order that he should cook for her.  “It’s like The White Cat to have it....”