Whitwell looked pleased.  “I’ll do my best-whenever you’re ready.”  He went on:  “Why, Jeff, here, has just got back, too.  Jeff, what was the name of that French boat you said you crossed on?  I want to see if I can’t make out what plantchette meant by that broken shaft.  She must have meant something, and if I could find out the name of the ship—­ Tell the ladies about it?” Jeff laughed, with a shake of the head, and Whitwell continued, “Why, it was like this,” and he possessed the ladies of a fact which they professed to find extremely interesting.  At the end of their polite expressions he asked Jeff again:  “What did you say the name was?”

“Aquitaine,” said Jeff, briefly.

“Why, we came on the Aquitaine!” said Mrs. Vostrand, with a smile for Jeff.  “But how did we happen not to see one another?”

“Oh, I came second-cabin,” said Jeff.  “I worked my way over on a cattle-ship to London, and, when I decided not to work my way back, I found I hadn’t enough money for a first-cabin passage.  I was in a hurry to get back in time to get settled at Harvard, and so I came second-cabin.  It wasn’t bad.  I used to see you across the rail.”

“Well!” said Whitwell.

“How very—­amusing!” said Mrs. Vostrand.  “What a small world it is!” With these words she fell into a vagary; her daughter recalled her from it with a slight movement.  “Breakfast?  How impatient you are, Genevieve!  Well!” She smiled the sweetest parting to Whitwell, and suffered herself to be led away by Jeff.

“And you’re at Harvard?  I’m so interested!  My own boy will be going there soon.”

“Well, there’s no place like Harvard,” said Jeff.  “I’m in my Sophomore year now.”

“Oh, a Sophomore!  Fancy!” cried Mrs. Vostrand, as if nothing could give her more pleasure.  “My son is going to prepare at St. Mark’s.  Did you prepare there?”

“No, I prepared at Lovewell Academy, over here.”  Jeff nodded in a southerly direction.

“Oh, indeed!” said Mrs. Vostrand, as if she knew where Lovewell was, and instantly recognized the name of the ancient school.

They had reached the dining room, and Jeff pushed the screen-door open with one hand, and followed the ladies in.  He had the effect of welcoming them like invited guests; he placed the ladies himself at a window, where he said Mrs. Vostrand would be out of the draughts, and they could have a good view of Lion’s Head.

He leaned over between them, when they were seated, to get sight of the mountain, and, “There!” he said.  “That cloud’s gone at last.”  Then, as if it would be modester in the proprietor of the view to leave them to their flattering raptures in it, he moved away and stood talking a moment with Cynthia Whitwell near the door of the serving-room.  He talked gayly, with many tosses of the head and turns about, while she listened with a vague smile, motionlessly.

“She’s very pretty,” said Miss Vostrand to her mother.