Stephen Gore was steering, his sister next him on his left, Lady Purcell on his right. And the moment that the two boats had drawn level, Anne Purcell had touched my lord’s knee with hers and glanced meaningly at Barbara, who had been looking back at the flashing oars of John Gore’s boat. Her mother had been on the watch for suggestions. And in such matters the most commonplace incidents may appear significant. Yet Barbara had merely been watching Sparkin’s drolleries, for one cannot always breathe to the rhythm of tragic verse. “Jack, my boy, when you put to sea with a boat-load of ‘baggage,’ you will find yourself faster than stately dowager-ladened ships.” My lord’s second cousin, my Lady Marden, a fat, happy woman eternally on the verge of laughter, shook the large green fan that ladies used then in the place of a parasol. “Dowagers, indeed! I am sure we look younger than our daughters.” “That is always the case,” said one of my lord’s friends. “I would venture it that Captain John would rather be in our boat,” and she glanced at Barbara as though for confirmation. Anne Purcell’s daughter gazed at the far bank over the lady’s shoulder. “Even a boat-load of aunts and cousins may be duller than a Barbary prison,” quoth my lord, with a play upon words that no one understood. “And even a weevily biscuit better than none—when you’re empty,” said Sparkin, who seemed to consider himself perfectly justified in airing his wit. But seeing that the venture drew a sharp and ominous glance from the great gentleman in the other boat, Sparkin became suddenly oblivious to its presence, and returned to tickling the brown neck of the man who pulled the bow oar—an act that stamped him as the meanest of opportunists, seeing that the man could not express himself in the presence of “quality.” The boats were still moving side by side when Mistress Catharine Gore, the deaf duenna, began asking questions in her shrill, aggressive voice. “Who’s that boy, Stephen?” My lord assumed an alarmed look and held up a silencing hand. “My dear Kate,” he shouted in her ear, “do not ask embarrassing questions.” His sister’s face betrayed a sudden gleam of shocked intelligence that made my lord’s fooling appear more piquant. Deafness had developed a habit of irritability in her, and she was accustomed to blurt out her opinions in a voice that she probably intended for a whisper. “You don’t say so, Stephen! I am astonished that your son should have the effrontery. But these sailors—” The other ladies began to giggle. My lord nudged his sister vigorously with his knee. “Jack brought the boy home from America with him.” “Why don’t you speak louder, Stephen? What did you say her name was?” But as she discovered that they were trying to hide their laughter behind fans and coat-sleeves, Mistress Catharine Gore gave her brother one stare, and relapsed into a silence that was not altogether amiable.