Primrose, who had something of the licence of the youngest, observed—-

“We have been telling him all about it.  He used to be Oliver Cromwell in ‘How Do You Like It?’ and now he will be a buccaneer!”

“Oliver Cromwell, you silly child!” burst out Gillian, with a little shake, while the rest fell into fits of laughing.

“I fear it was a less distinguished part,” said Captain Armytage.

“May I understand that you will help us?” said Lancelot.  “I heard of you at Devereux Castle.”

“I don’t think you heard much of my capabilities, especially musical ones.  I was the stick of the party,” said Captain Armytage.

It was explained that Captain Armytage had actually arrived that afternoon at the Cliff Hotel, and had walked over to call at Clipstone, whence he found the young ladies setting out to walk to Rockstone.  He could not deny that he had acted and sung, though, as he said, his performance in both cases was vile.  Little Miss Primrose had most comically taken upon her to patronize him, and to offer him as buccaneer captain had been a freak of her own, hardly to be accounted for, except that Purser Briggs’s unsuitableness had been discussed in her presence.

“Primrose is getting to be a horrid little forward thing,” observed Gillian to her aunt.

“A child of the present,” said Miss Mohun.  “Infant England!  But her suggestion seems to be highly opportune.”

“I don’t believe he can sing,” growled Gillian, “and it will be just an excuse for his hanging about here.”

There was something in Gillian’s “savagery” which gave Aunt Jane a curious impression, but she kept it to herself.

Late in the evening Lance appeared in his sister’s drawing-room with—-

“I have more hopes of it.  I did not think it was feasible when Anna wrote to me, but I see my way better now.  That parson, Flight, has a good notion of drilling, and that recruit of the little Merrifield girl, Captain Armytage, is worth having.”

“If he roared like a sucking dove we would have him, only to silence that awful boatswain,” said Gerald; “and as to the little Cigaretta, she is a born prima donna.”

“Your Miranda?  Are you content with her?” said his aunt.

“She is to the manner born.  Lovely voice, acts like a dragon, and has an instinct how to stand and how to hold her hands.”

“Coming in drolly with her prim dress and bearing.  Though she was dreadfully frightened,” said Lance.  “Being half-foreign accounts for something, I suppose, but it is odd how she reminds me of some one.  No doubt it is of some singer at a concert.  What did they say was her name?”

“Ludmilla Schnetterling, the Little Butterfly they call her.  Foreign on both sides apparently,” said Gerald.  “Those dainty ankles never were bred on English clods.”

“I wonder what her mother is,” said Mrs. Grinstead.