Smith seemed to be but the ordered instrument of fate, dispatched in a
rowboat to draw him against his will from the yacht to the town, where
all his business was neatly arranged for his doing. Certainly it
appeared as if the hand of intelligent destiny must have been in it
somewhere. No mere blind luck could have driven him half a mile into the
country to the one spot in all Hunston--impossibly unlikely as it
was--where he could become acquainted with Uncle Elbert's daughter
without the formality of an introduction.

Uncle Elbert! How desperately the old man must desire his daughter to
have planned a mad scheme like this with a subterfuge at the expense of
his best friend cunningly hidden away in the heart of it. Yet, after the
first staggering flash, Varney had found it impossible to be angry with
Mr. Carstairs. He only felt sorry for him, sorrier than he had ever felt
for anybody in his life. The old man's madness and his deceit were but
the measure of his desire for his daughter. And the more he desired her,
so it seemed to Varney, the more he was entitled to have her.

Interrupting his meditations, the steward approached on silent feet,
bearing a flat brown-paper package in his hand. It appeared that the
under-steward had just returned from a marketing tour in Hunston, had
met Mr. Maginnis on the street, and been ordered to take back the parcel
to Mr. Varney.

"All right, McTosh," said Varney.

He broke the string with some curiosity and pulled off the wrappers.
Within was nothing but a copy of a current literary monthly.

A present of a magazine from Peter! This was a delicate apology for his