But I wasn't allowed unlimited freedom, for Jenny and I had to sit at a table for a couple of hours every morning reading and writing, or listening to the Captain's instructions in geography or history, or whatever it was that he happened to pitch on. And when the big hand of the clock drew round to the second hour we weren't too eager to run away, for the Captain's teaching was more like story-telling than the kind of stuff I had been used to at Rancey Bridge. I think it was effective enough in its own way; for though I wasn't his pupil for very long, yet in those few days I began to get a definite picture of the course of English history and the ways of the world beyond the seas. With a longer course I dare say I should have grown wise enough in matters of international trade, and the bearing of geographical conditions on the life of the world; for these were the Captain's favourite themes. Still, interesting as I found all this, when once free of the class-room and out among the ruins with Jenny I didn't give much thought to what I had learnt. My whole soul was absorbed in play. And pretending to be investigating, rather than guiding, I took Jenny to every nook and corner of the old place, except indeed into the secret passage; for as a matter of fact I hadn't yet learnt how to open the door, though remembering Abou's long key I could guess that one of the little holes in the pitted surface of the wall was the entrance to the lock. All this, I say, had to be done as though everything were a fresh discovery to me, for I knew I mustn't let Jenny or her father know that I had lived there before. Anything which might conceivably involve my father had to be avoided, though I didn't imagine for one minute that the Captain's fate and my father's were in any manner interwoven; except indeed that they both seemed to be under the shadow of an invisible foe, and sometimes I wondered whether it was the same enemy that was pursuing them so ruthlessly. I soon found that Jenny had a fierce little heart; indeed I had discovered that on the first afternoon. But the days I now spent with her revealed her to me more and more vividly. Her fierceness was of a type that I appreciated and even admired. She never sulked when she couldn't have her own way. Her anger was the anger of an antagonist, not of a spoilt darling. We played our games indeed as though our whole strength and cunning were pitted against each other. We didn't play for the mere fun of the thing, but to win; and neither gave nor expected quarter. This was the sort of play I relished. There was a sting and a fervour in it that so far I had never known; for my father of course had always outmatched me, and if ever I outwitted him it seemed as a sort of concession to my weakness. But now we were both on our mettle; and the evenings found us weary to exhaustion with the exertions of our unending struggle.