"Not much difficulty about that," he said. "For instance, I don't mind obliging you--as a favor."

Mr. Vernon smiled.

"I thought perhaps you might be so good," he said; and he added casually: "Anybody here who could be trusted to bring them from the station?"

"I know a most trustworthy person; his name is Richard Lorton, and he will go for 'em in a brace of jiffs," said d.i.c.k.

Mr. Vernon flicked a five-pound note across the table.

"There may be some carriage. By the way, one of them is a lady's nag, and I fancy they may have sent a sidesaddle."

d.i.c.k nodded and repeated the grin.

"I can get them put up at Sandy's," he said. "Sandy used to keep some stables going for post horses before the coach ran to Hartland, you know. I've got your horse there. Oh, they'll be all right. You trust to me."

"I do," said Mr. Vernon. "One moment," as d.i.c.k was rushing out to put on his well-worn riding suit. "I don't think I'd say anything about--the sidesaddle to Miss Lorton--yet."

Once again d.i.c.k nodded--a nod so full of comprehension as to be almost supernal.

Mr. Vernon went upstairs, and, with Molly's a.s.sistance, unpacked the huge portmanteau, and, when she had got out of the room, examined the contents. Strangely enough, the linen was all new and unmarked. Only on the silver fittings of the dressing case were a monogram--in which the initial "S" was decipherable--and a coronet.

"Sparling's an idiot!" Vernon muttered. "Why didn't he buy a new case? I shall have to keep this locked."

When he came down again, having changed into a blue serge suit, Nell was in the drawing-room, arranging some flowers, and she looked up with a smile of recognition at his altered appearance.

"Your box has arrived, I see," she said, with the frankness of--well, Shorne Mills. "You must be glad. And where has d.i.c.k dashed off to? He nearly knocked me down in his hurry."

"To Shallop," he said. "I had a couple of horses sent down."

"But you couldn't ride, with your arm in a sling; and you've a horse here already."

"Don't suppose it's fit to ride yet," he said, "and I'm not going to carry a sling forever. Besides, they were eating their heads off--where they were."

He said nothing about the sidesaddle.

"I see. Well, I'm sorry d.i.c.k's gone this morning, for I wanted him to come out in the boat. It's a good day for mackerel." She looked wistfully at the sea shining below them. "Of course I could go by myself, but I promised Mr. Gadsby that I wouldn't."

"Who's Mr. Gadsby?"

"The vicar. I got caught in a squall off the Head one day, and--I really wasn't in the least danger--but they were all waiting for me at the jetty, and they made a fuss--and so I had to promise that I wouldn't go out alone. And old Brownie's out with his nets--he goes with me sometimes. It's a nuisance."

He stood by the window silently for a moment, then he glanced at her wistful face, and said:

"I should be a poor subst.i.tute, in my present condition, for old Brownie, or old anybody else; but if you'll allow me to go with you, I shall be very grateful. I can manage the tiller, at any rate."

Nell's face lit up; she wanted to go very badly; it was a "real"

mackerel day, and, like the days of other fishing, not to be missed.

"Will you? That's awfully kind of you! Not that I want any help; it isn't that, for I can manage the _Annie Laurie_ in half a gale; but there's a feeling that, because I'm only a girl, I'm not to be trusted alone."

"I quite understand," he said. "I'll promise not to interfere, if you'll let me come."

"And it may do you good--it's sure to!" she said eagerly. "There's the loveliest of breezes--you must have some wind for mackerel--and----Can you go at once?"

"This very minute. I'm all ready," he said.

"All right," she exclaimed, just as d.i.c.k might have done. "I'll be ready before you can say Jack Robinson!"

She ran out of the room and was down again in a very few minutes. Vernon glanced at her as they left the cottage and descended the steep road.

She had put on a short skirt of rough serge, with a jersey, which accentuated every flowing line of her girlish, graceful figure, and the dark hair rippled under a red tam-o'-shanter. He was familiar enough with the yachting costumes of fashion, but he thought that he had never seen anything so workmanlike and becoming as this get-up which Nell had donned so quickly and carelessly. As they walked down the steps which led to the jetty, Nell exchanging greetings at every step, an old fisherman, crippled with rheumatism, limped beside them, and helped to bring the boat to the jetty steps.

Nell eyed the _Annie Laurie_ lovingly, but said apologetically:

"She's a very good boat. Old, of course. She is a herring boat, and though she isn't fascinatingly beautiful, she can sail. d.i.c.k--helped by Brownie--decked her over, and d.i.c.k picked up a new set of sails last year from a man who was selling off his gear. Have you put in the bait and the lines, w.i.l.l.y?"

"Aye, aye, Miss Nell; I'm thinkin' you'll be gettin' some mackerel if the wind holds. Let me help 'ee wi' the sail."

"No, no," said Nell, "I can manage. Oh, please don't you trouble!" she added to Vernon. "If you'll give me the sheet--that's the rope by your hand."

Vernon nodded, and suppressed a smile.

"She'll go a bit tauter still, I think," he said, as Nell hoisted the mainsail.

She looked at him.

"You understand?" she said, with a little surprise.

Vernon thought of his crack yacht, but answered casually:

"I've done some yachting--yes."

"Yachting!" said Nell. "This isn't yachting. You must feel a kind of contempt for our poor old tub."

"Not at all; she's a good boat, I can see," he said.

Nell took up the oars, but she had to pull only a few strokes, for the wind soon filled the sail, and the _Annie Laurie_, as if piqued by the things that had been said of her, sprang forward before the wind.

Nell shipped the oars, looked up at the sail, and glanced at Vernon, who had taken his seat in the stern, and got hold of the tiller with an accustomed air.

"Make for the Head," she said. "I'll get the lines ready."

There was silence for a minute or two while she baited the lines and paid them out, and Vernon watched her with a kind of absent-minded interest.

She was quite intent on her work, and he felt that, so far as she was concerned, he might have been old Brownie, or the rheumatic w.i.l.l.y, or her brother d.i.c.k; and something in her girlish indifference to his presence and personality impressed him; for Drake, Viscount Selbie, was not accustomed to be pa.s.sed over as a nonent.i.ty by the women in whose company he chanced to be.

"That ought to fetch them," she said, eying the baited line with an air of satisfaction. "You might keep her to the wind a little more, Mr.

Vernon; she can carry all we've got, and more."