This I did. I told Sylvia how I had been accidentally brought to Captain Jabe's house, how I had strolled off in this direction, and how delighted I was to meet her here. In all this I was careful not to intimate that I had suspected her presence in this region. While speaking, I tried hard to think what I should say when she should remark, "Then you did not know I was here?" But she did not make this remark. She looked at me with a little puzzled wrinkle on her brow, and said, with a smile:-- "It is absolutely wonderful that you should be here, and I should not know it; and that I should be here, and you should not know it." Ever since my meeting with Mother Anastasia it had been my purpose, as soon as I could find or make an opportunity, to declare to Sylvia my love for her. Apart from my passionate yearning in this direction, I felt that what I had done and attempted to say when I had parted from my secretary made it obligatory on me, as a man of honor, to say more, the moment I should be able to do so. Now the opportunity had come; now we were alone together, and I was able to pour out before her the burning words which so often, in my hours of reverie, had crowded themselves upon my mind. The fates had favored me as I had had no reason to expect to be favored, but I took no advantage of this situation. I spoke no word of love. I cannot say that Sylvia's demeanor cooled my affection, but I can say that it cooled my desire for instantaneous expression of it. After her first moments of astonishment, her mind seemed entirely occupied with the practical unraveling of the problem of our meeting. I endeavored to make this appear a very commonplace affair. It was quite natural that my companion and I should come together to a region which he had before visited. "Yes," said she, "I suppose all out-of-the-way things can be made commonplace, if one reasons long enough. As for me, of course it is quite natural that, needing a change from the House of Martha, I should come to my mother's island." "Your mother!" I stammered. "Yes," she answered. "Mrs. Raynor, who spends her summers in that house over there, is my mother. Her brother is here, too, and she has some friends with her. Mother Anastasia was away recently on a little jaunt, and when she came back she said that I looked tired and wan, and that I ought to go to my mother's for a fortnight. So I came. That was all simple enough, you see."