The Captain’s embarrassment reached its height at this invitation.

“No, no,” he stammered, “we—­we can’t do that.  Couldn’t think of it, you know.  We—­we ain’t a mite hungry.  Had breakfast afore we left home, didn’t we, Mary-’Gusta?”

Keith laughed.  “Yes, I know,” he said; “and you left home about half-past five.  I’ve taken that early train myself.  If you’re not hungry you ought to be and luncheon is ready.  Emily—­Mrs. Wyeth—­has been expecting you.  She will be disappointed if you refuse.”

Mrs. Wyeth herself put in a word here.  “Of course they won’t refuse, John,” she said with decision.  “They must be famished.  Refuse!  The idea!  Captain Gould, Mr. Keith will look out for you; your niece will come with me.  Luncheon will be ready in five minutes.  Come, Mary.  That’s your name—­Mary—­isn’t it?  I’m glad to hear it.  It’s plain and it’s sensible and I like it.  The employment bureau sent me a maid a week ago and when she told me her name I sent her back again.  It was Florina.  That was enough.  Mercy!  All I could think of was a breakfast food.  Come, Mary.  Now, John, do be prompt.”

That luncheon took its place in Mary-’Gusta’s memory beside that of her first supper in the house at South Harniss.  They were both memorable meals, although alike in no other respects.  Mrs. Wyeth presided, of course, and she asked the blessing and poured the tea with dignity and businesslike dispatch.  The cups and saucers were of thin, transparent China, with pictures of mandarins and pagodas upon them.  They looked old-fashioned and they were; Mrs. Wyeth’s grandfather had bought them himself in Hongkong in the days when he commanded a clipper ship and made voyages to the Far East.  The teaspoons were queer little fiddle-patterned affairs; they were made by an ancestor who was a silversmith with a shop on Cornhill before General Gage’s army was quartered in Boston.  And cups and spoons and napkins were so clean that it seemed almost sacrilegious to soil them by use.

Captain Shadrach did not soil his to any great extent at first.  The Captain was plainly overawed by the genteel elegance of his surrounding and the manner of his hostess.  But Mr. Keith was very much at ease and full of fun and, after a time, a little of Shadrach’s self-consciousness disappeared.  When he learned that grandfather Wyeth had been a seafaring man he came out of his shell sufficiently to narrate, at Keith’s request, one of his own experiences in Hongkong, but even in the midst of his yarn he never forgot to address his hostess as “ma’am” and he did not say “Jumpin Judas” once.

After luncheon Mr. Keith and the Captain left the house together.  “Goin’ to attend to that little mite of business I spoke to you about, Mary-’Gusta,” explained Shadrach, confidentially.  “We’ll be back pretty soon.  I cal’late maybe you’d better wait here, that is,” with a glance at Mrs. Wyeth, “if it’ll be all right for you to.”