Obedient to her instructions, he had provided books of all sorts for the voyage, and they began to read together, foolishly imagining that, with the whole day at their disposal, they would do as much work as when they only met for an hour or two daily to accomplish a set purpose.  The result of their unbounded freedom was that conversation took the place of reading.  Hitherto Margaret had confined Claudius closely to the matter in hand, some instinct warning her that such an intimacy as had existed during his daily visits could only continue on the footing of severe industry she had established from the first.  But the sight of the open deck, the other people constantly moving to and fro, the proper aspect of the lady-companion, just out of earshot, and altogether the appearance of publicity which the sea-life lent to their tete-a-tete hours, brought, as a necessary consequence, a certain unbending.  It always seemed such an easy matter to call some third party into the conversation if it should grow too confidential.  And so, insensibly, Claudius and Margaret wandered into discussions about the feelings, about love, hate, and friendship, and went deep into those topics which so often end in practical experiment.  Claudius had lived little and thought much; Margaret had seen a great deal of the world, and being gifted with fine intuitions and tact, she had reasoned very little about what she saw, understanding, as she did, the why and wherefore of most actions by the pure light of feminine genius.  The Doctor theorised, and it interested his companion to find facts she remembered suddenly brought directly under a neat generalisation; and before long she found herself trying to remember facts to fit his theories, a mode of going in double harness which is apt to lead to remarkable but fallacious results.  In the intervals of theorising Claudius indulged in small experiments.  But Barker and the Duke played poker.

Of course the three men saw a good deal of each other—­in the early morning before the ladies came on deck, and late at night when they sat together in the smoking-room.  In these daily meetings the Duke and Claudius had become better acquainted, and the latter, who was reticent, but perfectly simple, in speaking of himself, had more than once alluded to his peculiar position and to the unexpected change of fortune that had befallen him.  One evening they were grouped as usual around the square table in the brightly-lighted little room that Barker and the Duke affected most.  The fourfold beat of the screw crushed the water quickly and sent its peculiar vibration through the vessel as she sped along in the quiet night.  The Duke was extended on a transom, and Claudius on the one opposite, while Barker tipped himself about on his chair at the end of the table.  The Duke was talkative, in a disjointed, monosyllabic fashion.

“Yes.  I know.  No end of a queer sensation, lots of money.  Same thing happened to me when I came of age.”