“I must, Dorothy.”

“When?”

“As soon as I can get passage.”

She passed me and seated herself on the lounge, leaving me to stand like a lout before her, ashamed of my youth and of the clumsiness of my great body.

“Ah, Richard,” she laughed, “confess to your old play mate!  I should like to know how many young men of wealth and family would give up the pleasures of a London season were there not a strong attraction in Maryland.”

How I longed to tell her that I would give ten years of my life to remain in England:  that duty to John Paul took me home.  But I was dumb.

“We should make a macaroni of you to amaze our colony,” said Dolly, lightly, as I sat down a great distance away; “to accept my schooling were to double your chances when you return, Richard.  You should have cards to everything, and my Lord Comyn or Mr. Fox or some one would introduce you at the clubs.  I vow you would be a sensation, with your height and figure.  You should meet all the beauties of England, and perchance,” she added mischievously, “perchance you might be taking one home with you.”

“Nay, Dolly,” I answered; “I am not your match in jesting.”

“Jesting!” she exclaimed, “I was never more sober.  But where is your captain?”

I said that I hoped that John Paul would be there shortly.

“How fanciful he is!  And his conversation,—­one might think he had acquired the art at Marly or in the Fauxbourg.  In truth, he should have been born on the far side of the Channel.  And he has the air of the great man,” said she, glancing up at ms, covertly.  “For my part, I prefer a little more bluntness.”

I was nettled at the speech.  Dorothy had ever been quick to seize upon and ridicule the vulnerable oddities of a character, and she had all the contempt of the great lady for those who tried to scale by pleasing arts.  I perceived with regret that she had taken a prejudice.

“There, Dorothy,” I cried, “not even you shall talk so of the captain.  For you have seen him at his worst.  There are not many, I warrant you, born like him a poor gardener’s son who rise by character and ability to be a captain at three and twenty.  And he will be higher yet.  He has never attended any but a parish school, and still has learning to astonish Mr. Walpole, learning which he got under vast difficulties.  He is a gentleman, I say, far above many I have known, and he is a man.  If you would know a master, you should see him on his own ship.  If you would know a gentleman, you have been with me in his mother’s cottage.”  And, warming as I talked, I told her of that saddest of all homecomings to the little cabin under Criffel’s height.

Small wonder that I adored Dorothy!

Would that I could paint her moods, that I might describe the strange light in her eyes when I had finished, that I might tell how in an instant she was another woman.  She rose impulsively and took a chair at my side, and said:—­