"And the fish swarming round the point," said Uncle Luke impatiently. "Why don't you go with them, girls?" "Right again, uncle," said Harry. The old man made him a mocking bow. "Go, uncle?" said Louise eagerly, and then checking herself. Duncan Leslie's heart sank like an ingot of his own copper dropped in a tub. "Yes, go." "If you think so, uncle--" "Well, I do," he said testily, "only pray go at once." "There!" cried Harry. "Come, Maddy." He held out his hand to his sister's companion, but she hesitated, still looking at Louise, whose colour was going and coming as she saw Pradelle take off his cap and follow his friend's example, holding out his hand to help her into the boat. "Yes, dear," she said to Madelaine gravely. "They would be terribly disappointed if we did not go." The next moment Madelaine was in the boat, Louise still hanging back till, feeling that it would be a slight worse than the refusal to go if she ignored the help extended to her, she laid her hand in Pradelle's, and stepped off the rock into the gently rising and falling boat. "Another of my mistakes," said Duncan Leslie to himself; and then he started as if some one had given him an electric shock. "Hullo!" cried the old man. "You're going too?" "I? going?" "Yes, of course! To take care of them. I'm not going to have them set off without some one to act as ballast to those boys." Louise mentally cast her arms round the old man's neck and kissed him. Harry, in the same manner, kicked his uncle into the sea, and Pradelle's eyes looked closer together than usual, as he turned them upon the young mine-owner. "I should only be too happy," said the latter, "if--" "Oh, there's plenty of room, Mr Leslie," cried the girls in duet. "Pray come." The invitation was so genuine that Leslie's heart seemed to leap. "Oh yes, plenty of room," said Harry, "only if the wind drops, you'll have to pull an oar." "Of course," said Leslie, stepping in. Harry raised the boat-hook, and thrust the little vessel away, and then began to step the mast. "Lay hold of the rudder, Leslie," he cried. "Send us up some fish for tea, uncle." "I'll wait and see first whether you come back," said the old man. "Good-bye, girls. Don't be uneasy. I'll go and tell the old people if you're drowned." "Thank you," shouted back the young man as he hoisted the little sail, which began to fill at once, and by the time he had it sheeted home, the boat was swiftly running eastward with the water pattering against her bows, and a panorama of surpassing beauty seeming to glide slowly by them on the left. "There!" cried Harry to his friend, who had seated himself rather sulkily forward, the order to take the tiller having placed Leslie between Louise and Madelaine. "Make much of it, Vic: Paddington to-morrow night, hansom cab or the Underground, and next morning the office. Don't you feel happy?" "Yes, now," said Pradelle, with a glance at Louise.