“Yes, so do we.  And there’s about as much prospect of his marrying her.  Rufus, it’s pretty hard!  She’s just in the mood to be taken with him, but she won’t let herself, because she knows it’s of no use.  That Miss Rasmith has been telling her how much he is run after, and I could see that that settled it for Ellen as plainly as if she said so.  More plainly, for there’s enough of the girl in her to make her say one thing when she means another.  She was just saying she was sick of him, and never wanted to speak to him again, when he came up and asked her to walk, and she went with him instantly.  I knew what she meant.  She wasn’t going to let him suppose that anything Miss Rasmith had said was going to change her.”

“Well, then,” said the judge, “I don’t see what you’re scared at.”

“I’m not scared. But, oh, Rufus!  It can’t come to anything!  There isn’t time!” An hysterical hope trembled in her asseveration of despair that made him smile.

“I guess if time’s all that’s wanted—­”

“He is going to get off at Boulogne.”

“Well, we can get off there, too.”

“Rufus, if you dare to think of such a thing!”

“I don’t.  But Europe isn’t so big but what he can find us again if he wants to.”

“Ah, if he wants to!”

Ellen seemed to have let her mother take her languor below along with the shawls she had given her.  Buttoned into a close jacket, and skirted short for the sea, she pushed against the breeze at Breckon’s elbow with a vigor that made him look his surprise at her.  Girl-like, she took it that something was wrong with her dress, and ran herself over with an uneasy eye.

Then he explained:  “I was just thinking how much you were like Miss Lottie-if you’ll excuse my being so personal.  And it never struck me before.”

“I didn’t suppose we looked alike,” said Ellen.

“No, certainly.  I shouldn’t have taken you for sisters.  And yet, just now, I felt that you were like her.  You seem so much stronger this morning—­perhaps it’s that the voyage is doing you good.  Shall you be sorry to have it end?”

“Shall you?  That’s the way Lottie would answer.”

Breckon laughed.  “Yes, it is.  I shall be very sorry.  I should be willing to have it rough again, it that would make it longer.  I liked it’s being rough.  We had it to ourselves.”  He had not thought how that sounded, but if it sounded particular, she did not notice it.

She merely said, “I was surprised not to be seasick, too.”

“And should you be willing to have it rough again?”

“You wouldn’t see anything more of your friends, then.”

“Ah, yes; Miss Rasmith.  She is a great talker, Did you find her interesting?”

“She was very interesting.”

“Yes?  What did she talk about?”

Ellen realized the fact too late to withhold “Why, about you.”

“And was that what made her interesting?”