"Curiously
enough, I was thinking more of your dilemma than of the signals when we
were overhauled by the _Sao Geronimo_ this morning. Odd, isn't it, how
things pop into one's mind at the most unexpected moments? While I was
coding our explanation that we were putting into Pernambuco for
repairs, and that no steam yacht had been sighted between here and the
River Plate, I was really trying to imagine what the cruiser's people
would have said if I had told them the actual truth."
His apparent gravity drew the girl's thoughts for an instant from
contemplating her own unhappiness.
"How could you have done that?" she asked. "We are going there to suit
Senhor De Sylva's ends. We have suffered so much already for his sake
that we could hardly betray him now."
Hozier spread wide his hands with a fine affectation of amazement.
"I wasn't talking about De Sylva," he cried. "My remarks were strictly
confined to the question of your marriage. I know you far too well,
Iris, to permit you to go back to Bootle to be lectured and browbeaten
by your uncle. I have never seen him, but, from all accounts, he is a
rather remarkable person. He likes to have his own way, irrespective
of other folks' feelings. I am a good guesser, Iris. I have a pretty
fair notion why Coke meant to leave our poor ship's bones on a South
American reef.
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