"My _family_," said Miss Ross somewhat coldly, "call me Jan." "Nice little name," he exclaimed, "but more like a boy's. Now, I never got a pet name. I started Langham, and Langham I've stopped, and I flatter myself I've made the name known and respected." He wanted her to look at him, and leaned towards her: "Look here, Miss Ross, I'm goin' to ask you a funny question, and it's not one you can ask most women--but you're a puzzle. You've got a face like a child, and yet you're as grey as a badger. What _is_ your age?" "I shall be twenty-eight in March." She looked at him then, and her grey eyes were so full of amusement that, incredulous as he usually was as to other people's statements, he knew that she was speaking the truth. "Then why the devil don't you _do_ something _to_ it?" he demanded. She laughed. "I couldn't be bothered. And it might turn green, or something. I don't mind it. It began when I was twenty-three." "_I_ don't mind it either," Sir Langham declared magnanimously; "but it's misleading." "I'm sorry," she said demurely. "I wouldn't mislead anyone for the world." "Now, what age should you think _I_ am? But I suppose you know--that's the worst of being a public character; when one gets nearly a column in _Who's Who_, everybody knows all about one. That's the penalty of celebrity." "Do you mind people knowing your age?" "Not I! Nor anything else about me. _I've_ never done anything to be ashamed of. Quite the other way, I can assure you." "How pleasant that must be," she said quietly. Sir Langham turned and looked suspiciously at her; but her face was guileless and calm, with no trace of raillery, her eyes still fixed on the long bright track of foam. "I suppose you, now," he muttered hoarsely, "always sleep well, go off directly you turn in--eh?" Her quiet eyes met his; little and fierce and truculent, but behind their rather bloodshot boldness there lurked something else, and with a sudden pang of pity she knew that it was fear, and that Sir Langham dreaded the night. "As a rule I do," she said gently; "but of course I've known what it is to be sleepless, and it's horrid." "It's hell," said Sir Langham, "and I'm in it every night this voyage, for I've knocked off morphia and opiates--they were playing the deuce with my constitution, and I've strength of mind for anything when I fairly take hold. But it's awful. When d'you suppose natural sleep will come back?" She knew that he did not lack physical courage, that he had fearlessly faced great dangers in many outposts of the world; but the demon of insomnia had got a hold of Sir Langham, and he dreaded the night unspeakably. At that moment there was something pathetic about the little, boastful, filibustering man. "I think you will sleep to-night," she said confidently, "especially if you go to bed early." She half rose as she spoke, but he put his hand on her arm and pressed her down in her chair again.