Robert Grimshaw was departing that day for the city of Athens, where for two months he was to attend to the business of the firm of Peter Lascarides and Co., of which he was a director. III WITH her eyes on the grey pinnacles of the Scillies, Katya Lascarides rose from her deck-chair, saying to Mrs. Van Husum: “I am going to send a marconigram.” Mrs. Van Husum gave a dismal but a healthy groan. It pleased Katya, since it took the place of the passionately pleading “Oh, don’t leave me--don’t leave me!” to which Katya Lascarides had been accustomed for many months. It meant that her patient had arrived at a state of mind so normal that she was perfectly fit to be left to the unaided care of her son and daughter-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Clement P. Van Husum junior, who resided at Wantage. Indeed, Mrs. Van Husum’s groan was far more the sound of an elderly lady recovering from the troubles of sea-sickness than that which would be made by a neurotic sufferer from the dread of solitude. Katya, with her tranquil and decided step, moved along the deck and descended the companion forward to where the Marconi installation sent out its cracklings from a little cabin surrounded by what appeared a schemeless jumble of rusty capstans and brown cables. With the same air of pensive introspection and tranquil resolve she leaned upon the little slab that was devoted to the sender of telegrams, and wrote to her sister Ellida, using the telegraphic address of her husband’s office: “Shall reach London noon to-morrow. Beg you not to meet ship or to come to hotel for three days. Writing conditions.” And, having handed in this message through the little shutter to the invisible operator, she threaded her way with the same pensiveness between the capstans and the ropes up the companion and on to the upper deck where, having adjusted the rugs around the dozing figure of Mrs. Van Husum in her deck-chair, she paused, with her grey eyes looking out across the grey sea, to consider the purplish islands, fringed with white, the swirls of foam in the greeny and slate-coloured waters, the white lighthouse, and a spray-beaten tramp-steamer that, rolling, undulating, and battling through the long swell between them and the Scillies, was making its good departure for Mexico. Tall, rounded, in excellent condition, with slow but decided actions, with that naturally pale complexion and clean-cut run of the cheek-bone from chin to ear which came to her with her Greek parentage, Katya Lascarides was reflecting upon the terms of her letter to her sister.