For, said Dick to Roscoria one afternoon, as that distinguished preceptor was on the point of joining his adoring disciples: "Wish me good luck, old comrade: I am off on a forlorn hope." "That child?" cried Roscoria, dropping an armful of the Clarendon Press series with resounding bang upon the floor. "That child!" intoned Tregurtha, mechanically, with the voice of a captive spirit from a tomb. "I feel it is utterly hopeless madness; but I shan't be ashore much longer, and I must go to sea with a certainty behind me. I was never a man to go doubting when knowledge could be had for the asking. So I'll go and have my mind set at rest. I shall be satisfied this evening, I trust, and then I'll come back to you, Roscoria." "Yes, you are sure of me, at any rate. I'm afraid you are making a mistake, old fellow; but I dare say you can't help it." Pythias whistled sympathetically as Damon went out by the window with his hat over his brows and his teeth set. Rosetta Villiers was playing about in the admiral's garden. At least, she thought she was working, but the sun was hot and there was a pleasant shade under that chestnut-tree. So she left off weeding and tying up roses, and sat dreamily down on a wooden seat to divide her attention between a book and a flitting dragon-fly. Tregurtha came walking informally through the garden, for was he not hand-in-glove with the admiral? Rosetta looked up brightly, extended her hand to Jevons in smiling appeal, and pointed to the other end of her rustic sofa. "I'm not up to logic to-day, dear Miss Villiers," said Tregurtha, with quiet despondency; "I have brought you a problem harder to solve than any in that class-book of yours. Do throw it over the hedge for half an hour, for indeed it is not opportune!" Rosetta's astonishment was instructive to see. She clasped the book tighter and said, breathlessly: "You are strange, Mr. Tregurtha. Sit down here, and please don't look at me like the reproachful manes of my grandfather! There, at any rate, it is only a despairing profile that I see--the full face was unendurable." "Just allow me," said Tregurtha, and he put Stanley Jevons into his pocket. "There! now I have no rival save the landscape. I say, listen, Miss Villiers. I--oh! but you will never understand--you will not understand!" "I will do my best," said Rosetta, with a childish touch of pride. "Am I so stupid?" "My little Rosetta, no!" cried Tregurtha, with an excess of tenderness which overwhelmed him; "but this is something which mere cleverness will never teach you, and which I cannot explain to you. Roscoria could have done it," he sighed, "but I am an inferior creature; besides, I shall only be speaking out my own disappointment. Well, best have it over; after all it won't take long. Rosetta, how do you think of me?" "As my friend," answered Rosetta, promptly. "Ah! and all the time I am only your lover!" "My lover!"