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“Mrs. Rattleton is from New York, and she was here last season,” Livingstone answered. “But I can’t say that I remember anything eccentric in her bathing costume, except that it was exceedingly becoming; and I certainly never heard any disagreeable talk about her. There may have been such talk about her, but perhaps it was thought just as well not to have it in my presence. Mrs. Rattleton is my cousin, Mr. Port–she was a Van Twiller, you know. Do you happen to remember any of the things that were said about her, and who said them?” Livingstone spoke with extreme courtesy; but there was something in his tone that caused Mr. Port suddenly to think of the tip of Prince Sporetti’s left ear, and that led him to reply hurriedly, and by no means lucidly:

“Certainly–no–yes–that is to say, I can’t exactly remember anything in particular. I’m sure I was led to believe from what was said that she was a very charming woman. No, I don’t remember at all.”

“Ah, perhaps it is just as well,” Livingstone replied, gravely. “But how lucky!” he added; “there she is now. Everybody is at the Casino about this time of day, I fancy. May I bring her over and present her to you, Miss Lee?”

“Of course you may, Mr. Livingstone. I shall be delighted to meet her. And if she is to matronize me, the sooner that I begin to get accustomed to her severities the better.”

And then Mr. Hutchinson Port suffered a fresh pang of misery when the presentation was accomplished and he was forced to say approximately pleasant things to a lady whose decidedly ballet-like attire in the surf–or, to be precise, on the beach above high-water-mark, where, for some occult reason, she usually saw fit to do the most of her bathing–joined to the exceeding celerity of her conduct generally, had marked her during the preceding season as the conspicuous centre of one phase of life at the Pier. Nor was Mr. Port’s lot made happier as he listened to the brisk discussion that ensued in regard to the organization of the yachting party, and found that its two remaining members were to be drawn, as was only natural, from the eminently meteoric set to which Mrs. Rattleton belonged.

Had time been given Mr. Port for consideration it is probable that he would have collected his mental forces sufficiently to have enabled him to lodge a remonstrance; he might even–though this is doubtful, for Dorothy’s voting power was vigorous–have accomplished a veto. But projects in which Mrs. Rattleton was concerned never went slowly; and in the present case the necessity for getting back in time for the races really compelled haste. And so it came to pass that not until the Fleetwings was off the Brenton’s Reef light-ship, with her nose pointed well up into the north-east, was there framed in Mr. Port’s slow-moving mind a suitable line of argument upon which to base a peremptory refusal to go upon the expedition–and by that time he was so excruciatingly ill in his own cabin that coherent utterance and converse with his kind were alike impossible.

So far as Mr. Port was concerned the ensuing six days made up an epoch in his life that can only be described as an agonized blank. And when–as it seemed to him many ages later–the Fleetwings once more cast anchor off Narragansett Pier, and he stepped shakily from the schooner’s gig to the Casino dock, the usual plumpness and ruddiness of his face had given place to a yellow leanness, and his weight had been reduced by very nearly twenty pounds. The cruise had been a flying one, or he never would have finished it. After the first six hours he would have landed on a desert island cheerfully–and it is not impossible that a hint from Dorothy as to her uncle’s probable movements should a harbor be made had induced Livingstone to give the land a wide berth.