The Count de Roannes came unexpectedly and unobserved upon the climax of
the little scene, and read into it more significance than it really had.
It was not strange, perhaps, that to him this meeting should savour of
clandestine relations and that he should impute to it false motives and
impulses. The Count prided himself upon his tact, and was therefore very
careful to use the most idiomatic English in his conversation. But at
this sudden discovery--for he had not imagined that the acquaintance had
gone beyond his own discernment--he felt the English language quite
inadequate to the occasion, and muttered something under his breath that
sounded remarkably like "_Tison d'enfer!_" as he turned on his heel and
made for his stateroom.

And the Boy, unconscious and indifferent to all this by-play, had only
time to press to his lips the little hand she had surrendered to him
before the crowd was upon them.

But the waves were singing a Te Deum in his ears, and the skies were
bluer in the moonlight than ever sea-skies were before. Paul felt, with
a thrill of joy, that he was looking far off into the vaster spaces of
life, with their broader, grander possibilities. He felt that he was
wiser, nobler, stronger--nearer his ideal of what a brave man should be.




CHAPTER IX


When two are young, and at sea, and in love, and the world is beautiful