Chapter VII

One morning, when Kenyon went to his state-room on hearing the breakfast-gong, he found the lazy occupant of the upper berth still in his bunk.

'Come, Wentworth,' he shouted, 'this won't do, you know. Get up! get up! breakfast, my boy! breakfast!--the most important meal in the day to a healthy man.'

Wentworth yawned and stretched his arms over his head.

'What's the row?' he asked.

'The row is, it's time to get up. The second gong has sounded.'

'Dear me! is it so late? I didn't hear it.' Wentworth sat up in his bunk, and looked ruefully over the precipice down the chasm to the floor. 'Have you been up long?' he asked.

'Long? I have been on deck an hour and a half,' answered Kenyon.

'Then, Miss What's-her-Name must have been there also.'

'Her name is Miss Longworth,' replied Kenyon, without looking at his comrade.

'That's her name, is it? and she was on deck?'

'She was.'

'I thought so,' said Wentworth; 'just look at the divine influence of woman! Miss Longworth rises early, therefore John Kenyon rises early. Miss Brewster rises late, therefore George Wentworth is not seen until breakfast-time. If the conditions were reversed, I suppose the getting-up time of the two men would be changed accordingly.'

'Not at all, George--not at all. I would rise early whether anybody else on board did or not. In fact, when I got on deck this morning, I expected to have it to myself.'

'I take it, though, that you were not grievously disappointed when you found you hadn't a monopoly?'

'Well, to tell the truth, I was not; Miss Longworth is a charmingly sensible girl.'

'Oh, they all are,' said Wentworth lightly. 'You had no sympathy for me the other day. Now you know how it is yourself, as they say across the water.'

'I don't know how it is myself. The fact is, we were talking business.'

'Really? Did you get so far?'

'Yes, we got so far, if that is any distance. I told her about the mica-mine.'

'Oh, you did! What did she say? Will she invest?'

'Well, when I told her we expected to form a company for fifty thousand pounds, she said it was such a small sum, she doubted if we could get anybody interested in it in London.'

Wentworth, who was now well advanced with his dressing, gave a long whistle.

'Fifty thousand pounds a small sum? Why, John, she must be very wealthy! Probably more so than the American millionairess.'

'Well, George, you see, the difference between the two young ladies is this: that while American heiresses are apt to boast of their immense wealth, English women say nothing about it.'

'If you mean Miss Brewster when you speak in that way, you are entirely mistaken. She has never alluded to her wealth at all, with the exception of saying that her father was a millionaire. So if the young woman