“The Mount is only delightful--I might say endurable--when I have neighbours at the Angler’s Nest.” “Martin will let this house, perhaps, and you may have pleasant neighbours in the new people.” “I am not like the domestic cat. It is not houses I care for, but individuals. My affections would not transfer themselves to the new tenants.” “How can you tell that? You think of them to-night as strangers--and they seem intolerable. You would like them after a week, and be warmly attached to them at the end of a month. Why, you have known us for less than three months, and we fancy ourselves quite old friends.” “Oh, Miss Leland, is our friendship only fancy? Will a thousand miles make you forget me?” “No, we could not any of us be so ungrateful as to forget you,” answered Allegra, struggling against growing embarrassment, wondering if this tender tone, these vague nothings, were drifting towards a declaration, or were as simply meaningless as much of the talk between men and women. “We can’t forget how kind you have been, and what delightful excursions we have had on the _Vendetta_.” “The _Vendetta_ will be at San Remo when you want her, Allegra. She will be as much at your command there as she has been here; and her skipper will be as much your slave as he is here--as he has been almost ever since he saw your face.” This was not small talk. This meant something very serious. He had called her Allegra, and she had not reproved him; he had taken her hand and she had not withdrawn it. In the next instant, she knew not how, his arm was round her waist, and her head, weary with the long day’s work and anxieties, was resting contentedly on his shoulder, while his lips set their first kiss, tenderly, reverently almost, on her fair broad brow. “Allegra, this means yes, does it not? Our lives have flowed on together so peacefully, so happily, since last October. They are to mingle and flow on together to the great sea, are they not, love--the sea of death and eternity.” “Do you really care for me?” “Do I really adore you? Yes, dear love. With all my power of adoration.” “But you must have cared for other girls before now. I can’t believe that I am the first.” “Believe, at least, that you will be the last, as you are the only woman I ever asked to be my wife.” “Is that really, really true?” “It is true as the needle to the north.” “Yet they say that sailors----” “Are generally tolerable dancers, and popular in a ball-room, especially when they are the givers of the ball--that they can talk to pretty women without feeling abashed--and that they contrive to get through a good deal of flirting without singeing their wings. I have waltzed with a good many nice girls in my time, Allegra, and I have sat out a good many waltzes. Yet I am here at your side, honestly and devotedly your own; and I have never loved any other woman with the love I feel for you. No other woman has ever held my whole heart; no, not for a single hour.”