Croonah, has quite a reputation on the Indian route, and your
fellow-officers are all gentlemen. I shall be pleased to see you to
dinner the first evening you have at your disposal. I dine at
seven-thirty.--Believe me, yours very truly, MARIAN HARRINGTON.

"P.S.--I shall deem it a favour if you will come in dress clothes,
as I have visitors."

And, strange to say, it was the feminine stab in the postscript that
settled the matter. Luke sat down and wrote out a telegram at once,
accepting Mrs. Harrington's invitation for the same evening.

When he rang the bell of the great house in Grosvenor Gardens at
precisely half-past seven that evening, he was conscious of a
certain sense of elation. He was quite sure of himself.

He thought that the large drawing-room was empty when the butler
ushered him into it, and some seconds elapsed before he discerned
the form of a young lady in a deep chair near the fire.

The girl turned her head and rose from the chair with a smile and a
certain grace of manner which seemed in some indefinite way to have
been put on with her evening dress. For a moment Luke gazed at her,
taken aback. Then he bowed gravely, and she burst into a merry
laugh.

"How funny!" she cried. "You do not know me?"

"No-o-o," he answered, searching his mind. For he was a passenger
sailor, and many men and women crossed his path during the year.