“A wild chap!” said the captain—­“Many of these fellows get half daft, living so much alone in desolate places like Mull, and seeing nothing all their time but cloud and mountain and sea.  He seems to know something about that yacht, though!”

“That yacht is on your brain, Captain!” I said, merrily—­“I feel quite sorry for you!  And yet I daresay if we meet her again the mystery will turn out to be very simple.”

“It will have to be either very simple or very complex!” he answered, with a laugh—­“I shall need a good deal of teaching to show me how a sailing yacht can make steam speed without wind.  Ah, good morning, sir!”

And we both turned to greet Mr. Harland, who had just come up on deck.  He looked ill and careworn, as though he had slept badly, and he showed but faint interest in the tale of the strange yacht’s sudden exit.

“It amuses you, doesn’t it?”—­he said, addressing me with a little cynical smile wrinkling up his forehead and eyes—­“Anything that cannot be at once explained is always interesting and delightful to a woman!  That is why spiritualistic ‘mediums’ make money.  They do clever tricks which cannot be explained, hence their success with the credulous.”

“Quite so”—­I replied—­“but just allow me to say that I am no believer in ‘mediums.’”

“True,—­I forgot!” He rubbed his hand wearily over his brows—­then asked—­“Did you sleep well?”

“Splendidly!  And I must really thank you for my lovely rooms,—­they are almost too luxurious!  They are fit for a princess.”

“Why a princess?” he queried, ironically—­“Princesses are not always agreeable personages.  I know one or two,—­fat, ugly and stupid.  Some of them are dirty in their persons and in their habits.  There are certain ‘princesses’ in Europe who ought to be washed and disinfected before being given any rooms anywhere!”

I laughed.

“Oh, you are very bitter!” I said.

“Not at all.  I like accuracy.  ‘Princess’ to the ingenuous mind suggests a fairy tale.  I have not an ingenuous mind.  I know that the princesses of the fairy tales do not exist,—­unless you are one.”

“Me!” I exclaimed, in amazement—­“I’m very far from that—­”

“Well, you are a dreamer!” he said, and resting his arms on the deck rail he looked away from me down into the sunlit sea—­“You do not live here in this world with us—­you think you do,—­and yet in your own mind you know you do not.  You dream—­and your life is that of vision simply.  I’m not sure that I should like to see you wake.  For as long as you can dream you will believe in the fairy tale;—­the ‘princess’ of Hans Andersen and the Brothers Grimm holds good—­and that is why you should have pretty things about you,—­music, roses and the like trifles,—­to keep up the delicate delusion.”