"Are you a sailor?" inquired Luke, almost pleasantly. With Willie Carr it was difficult to be stiff and formal. "Not I; but I'm interested in shipping--not the navy, you know--merchant service. I'm something in the City, like the young man on the omnibus, eh?" "I'm in the merchant service," answered Luke. "Ah! What ship?" "The Croonah." "Croonah," repeated Carr, hastily scribbling his name on Agatha's programme. "Fine ship; I know her well by name. Know 'em all on paper, you know. I'm an insurance man--what they call a doctor--Lloyd's and all that; missing ships, overdue steamers, hedging and dodging, and the inner walks of marine insurance--that's yours truly. Croonah's a big value, _I_ know." He looked up keenly over Agatha's engagement card. The look was not quite in keeping with his bluff and open manners. Moreover, a man who is, so to speak, not in keeping with himself is one who requires watching. "Yes, she is a fine ship," answered Luke, with a momentary thought of the Terrific. "Tell me," went on Carr, confidentially plucking Luke's sleeve, "when she is going to the bottom, and I'll do a line for you--make your fortune for you. You'd not be the first man who has come to me, with his hair hardly dry, for a cheque." Luke laughed and went away in answer to Mrs. Harrington's beckoning finger. Fitz was coming towards Agatha and her companion. "Holloa!" exclaimed Carr, "I'm blowed if here is not a second edition of the same man." "His brother," explained Agatha, who saw Fitz coming, although she was apparently looking the other way. "Royal Navy," muttered Carr. "Yes." "Then I'm off. Can't get on with Royal Navy men, somehow." With a jovial nod and something remarkably near a wink, Willie Carr left her, shouldering his way through the crowd with that good-natured boisterousness of manner which is accepted by the world for honesty. Agatha was looking the other way when Fitz came to her, and he was forced to touch her and repeat his desire to be accorded a dance before she became aware of his proximity. "Certainly," she answered rather carelessly, "if you want one. I--"--she paused with infinite skill and looked down at her own dress--"I thought I had displeased you." Fitz looked slightly surprised. "What an absurd thing to think!" he said rather lamely. She glanced up with pert coquetry. "Then it was only oblivion or indifference." "What was only oblivion or indifference?" he asked, still smiling as he compared cards. "Your very obvious delay in coming," she answered. "Considering that we have known each other since we were children, it is only natural that I should want to dance with you." "Considering that we have known each other since we were children," he said, repeating her words and tone, "may I have a third?"