"She has no claim on me, none at all----" the man spoke defensively. "I
don't think she'd expect anything of that sort. She's had a very good
time with me. After all, I haven't treated her badly." "I'm sure you haven't," Nan spoke very gently. "I am sure you have been
always kind to her. But, if I may use the simile you used just now,
life, even to the happiest, the most sheltered, of women, isn't all
jam!" The man looked at her with a doubting, shame-faced glance. "I expect
you're right," he said abruptly. "I ought to have thought of it. I'll
make my will when I'm in England this time--I ought to have done so
before." Suddenly Coxeter leant forward. He felt the time had come when he really
must put an end to this most unseemly conversation. "Mrs. Archdale?" he spoke loudly, insistently. She looked up, startled
at the sharpness of the tone, and the man next her, whose eyes had been
fixed on her face with so moved and doubting a look, sat back. "I want
to tell you that I've seen your inventor, and that I've promised to put
his invention before the right quarter at the Admiralty." In a moment Nan was all eagerness. "It really is a very wonderful
thing," she said; "I'm so grateful, Mr. Coxeter. Did you go and see it
tried? _I_ did, last time I was in Paris; the man took me to a
swimming-bath on the Seine--such an odd place--and there he tested it
before me. I was really very much impressed. I do hope you will say a
word for it. I am sure they would value your opinion." Coxeter looked at her rather grimly. "No, I didn't see it tested." To
think that she should have wasted even an hour of her time in such a
foolish manner, and in such a queer place, too! "I didn't see the use of
doing so, though of course the man was very anxious I should. I'm
afraid the thing's no good. How could it be?" He smiled superciliously,
and he saw her redden. "How unfair that is!" she exclaimed. "How can you possibly tell whether
it's no good if you haven't seen it tried? Now I _have_ seen the thing
tried." There was such a tone of protest in her voice that Coxeter felt called
upon to defend himself. "I daresay the thing's all right in theory," he
said quickly, "and I believe what he says about the ordinary life-belts;
it's quite true, I mean, that they drown more people than they save: but
that's only because people don't know how to put them on. This thing's a
toy--not practical at all." He spoke more irritably than he generally
allowed himself to speak, for he could see that the Jew was listening to
all that they were saying. All at once, Mrs. Archdale actually included the sweetmeat stranger in
their conversation, and Coxeter at last found himself at her request
most unwillingly taking the absurd model out of his bag. "Of course
you've got to imagine this in a rough sea," he said sulkily, playing the
devil's advocate, "and not in a fresh water river bath." "Well, _I_ wouldn't mind trying it in a rough sea, Mr. Coxeter." Nan
smiled as she spoke. Coxeter wondered if she was really serious. Sometimes he suspected that
Mrs. Archdale was making fun of him--but that surely was impossible. II

When at last they reached Boulogne and went on board the packet,
Coxeter's ill-humour vanished. It was cold, raw, and foggy, and most of
their fellow-passengers at once hurried below, but Mrs. Archdale decided
to stay on the upper deck. This pleased her companion; now at last he
would have her to himself. In his precise and formal way he went to a good deal of trouble to make
Nan comfortable; and she, so accustomed to take thought for others,
stood aside and watched him find a sheltered corner, secure with some
difficulty a deck chair, and then defend it with grim determination
against two or three people who tried to lay hands upon it. At last he beckoned to her to sit down. "Where's your rug?" he asked. She answered meekly, "I haven't brought one." He put his own rug,--large, light, warm, the best money could buy--round
her knees; and in the pleasure it gave him to wait on her thus he did
not utter aloud the reproof which had been on his lips. But she saw him
shake his head over a more unaccountable omission--on the journey she
had somehow lost her gloves. He took his own off, and with a touch of
masterfulness made her put them on, himself fastening the big bone
buttons over each of her small, childish wrists; but his manner while he
did all these things--he would have scorned himself had it been
otherwise--was impersonal, businesslike. There are men whose every gesture in connection with a woman becomes an
instinctive caress. Such men, as every woman learns in time, are not
good "stayers," but they make the time go by very quickly--sometimes. With Coxeter every minute lasted sixty seconds. But Nan Archdale found
herself looking at him with unwonted kindliness. At last she said, a
little tremulously, and with a wondering tone in her voice, "You're very
kind to me, Mr. Coxeter." Those who spend their lives in speeding others
on their way are generally allowed to trudge along alone; so at least
this woman had found it to be. Coxeter made no answer to her
words--perhaps he did not hear them. Even in the few minutes which had elapsed since they came on board, the
fog had deepened. The shadowy figures moving about the deck only took
substance when they stepped into the circle of brightness cast by a
swinging globe of light which hung just above Nan Archdale's head. Coxeter moved forward and took up his place in front of the deck-chair,
protecting its occupant from the jostling of the crowd, for the
sheltered place he had found stood but a little way back from the
passage between the land gangway and the iron staircase leading to the
lower deck. There were more passengers that night than usual. They passed, a
seemingly endless procession, moving slowly out of the darkness into the
circle of light and then again into the white, engulfing mist. At last the deck became clear of moving figures; the cold, raw fog had
driven almost everyone below. But Coxeter felt curiously content, rather
absurdly happy. This was to him a great adventure.... He took out his watch. If the boat started to time they would be off in
another five minutes. He told himself that this was turning out a very
pleasant journey; as a rule when crossing the Channel one meets tiresome
people one knows, and they insist on talking to one. And then, just as
he was thinking this, there suddenly surged forward out of the foggy
mist two people, a newly married couple named Rendel, with whom both he
and Mrs. Archdale were acquainted, at whose wedding indeed they had both
been present some six or seven weeks ago. So absorbed in earnest talk
with one another were the bride and bridegroom that they did not seem to
see where they were going; but when close to Mrs. Archdale they stopped
short, and turned towards one another, still talking so eagerly as to be
quite oblivious of possible eavesdroppers.