“More trifle?” he suggested, with an arch glance.  Jenny noticed he wore a gold ring upon the little finger of his right hand.  It gleamed in the faint glow of the cabin.  So, also, did the fascinating golden hairs upon the back of his hand.  Gently the cabin rose and fell, rocking so slowly that she could only occasionally be sure that the movement was true.  She shook her head in reply.

“I’ve had one solid meal to-night,” she explained.  “Wish I hadn’t!  If I’d known I was coming out I’d have starved myself all day.  Then you’d have been shocked at me!”

Keith demurely answered, as if to reassure her: 

“Takes a lot to shock me.  Have a peach?”

“I must!” she breathed.  “I can’t let the chance slip.  O-oh, what a scent!” She reached the peach towards him.  “Grand, isn’t it!” Jenny discovered for Keith’s quizzical gaze an unexpected dimple in each pale cheek.  He might have been Adam, and she the original temptress.

“Shall I peel it?”

“Seems a shame to take it off!” Jenny watched his deft fingers as he stripped the peach.  The glowing skin of the fruit fell in lifeless peelings upon his plate, dying as it were under her eyes, Keith had poured wine for her in another, smaller, glass.  She shook her head.

“I shall be drunk!” she protested.  “Then I should sing!  Horrible, it would be!”

“Not with a little port ...  I’m not pressing you to a lot.  Am I?” He brought coffee to the table, and she began to admire first of all the pattern of the silver tray.  Jenny had never seen such a tray before, outside a shop, nor so delicately porcelain a coffee-service.  It helped to give her the sense of strange, unforgettable experience.

“You didn’t say if you’d remember this evening,” she slowly reflected.  Keith looked sharply up from the coffee, which he was pouring, she saw, from a thermos flask.

“Didn’t I?” he said.  “Of course I shall remember it.  I’ve done better.  I’ve looked forward to it.  That’s something you’ve not done.  I’ve looked forward to it for weeks.  You don’t think of that.  We’ve been in the Mediterranean, coasting about.  I’ve been planning what I’d do when we got back.  Then Templecombe said he’d be coming right up to London; and I planned to see you.”

“Templecombe?” Jenny queried.  “Who’s he?”

“He’s the lord who owns this yacht.  Did you think it was my yacht?”

“No....  I hoped it wasn’t....”  Jenny said slowly.

viii

Keith’s eyes were upon her; but she looked at her peach stone, her hand still lightly holding the fruit knife, and her fingers half caught by the beam of a candle which stood beside her.  He persisted: 

“Well, Templecombe took his valet, who does the cooking; and my hand—­my sailorman—­wanted to go and visit his wife ... and that left me to see after the yacht.  D’you see?  I had the choice of keeping Tomkins aboard, or staying aboard myself.”