Chichester turned his head away, as from a jest too clownish to be worthy of attention. His cheek was large, and had a tender, beefy flush in it. "In my house," he said to Philippa, "I never allow the knives to be sharpened. If meat requires a sharp knife it is not fit to eat." "No, of course not!" replied Philippa, with nauseating hypocrisy. "The principle on which my wife buys meat," I said to the table at large, "is to say to the butcher, 'I want the best meat in your shop; but don't show it to me!'" "Mrs. Yeates is quite right," said Chichester seriously; "you should be able to trust your butcher." The door flew open, and Lady Derryclare strode in, wrestling as she came with the strings of a painting apron, whose office had been no sinecure. She was tall and grey-haired, and was just sufficiently engrossed in her own pursuits to be an attractive hostess. "It was perfectly lovely out there on the _Sheila_," she said, handing the apron to the butler, who removed it from the room with respectful disapproval. "If only she hadn't swung with the tide! I found my sketch had more and more in it every moment--turning into a panorama, in fact! Yachts would be perfect if they had long solid legs and stood on concrete." I said that I thought a small island would do as well. Lady Derryclare disputed this, and argued that an island would involve a garden, whereas the charm of a yacht was that one hideous bunch of flowers on the cabin table was all that was expected of it, and that kind people ashore always gave it vegetables. I said that these things did not concern me, as I usually neither opened my eyes or touched food while yachting. I said this very firmly, being not without fear that I might yet find myself hustled into becoming one of the party that was to go aboard the _Sheila_ that very night. They were to start on the top of the tide, that is to say, at 4 A.M. the following morning, to sail round the coast to a bay some thirty miles away, renowned for its pollack-fishing, and there to fish. Pollack-fishing, as a sport, does not appeal to me; according to my experience, it consists in hauling up coarse fish out of deep water by means of a hook baited with red flannel. It might appear poor-spirited, even effeminate, but nothing short of a press-gang should get me on board the _Sheila_ that night. "Every expedition requires its martyr," said Lady Derryclare, helping herself to some of the best cold salmon it has been my lot to encounter, "it makes it so much pleasanter for the others; some one they can despise and say funny things about." "The situation may produce its martyr," I said. Lady Derryclare glanced quickly at me, and then at Chichester, who was now expounding to Philippa the method, peculiar to himself, by which he secured mountain mutton of the essential age.