n do the most extraordinary things exactly
like a boy. I am always afraid of her coming to grief, but she never
does."

"Funny little beggar!" said Saltash.

"I am quite sure of one thing," pursued Maud. "She never learnt these
things at any school. She tells me she has been to a good many."

"I believe that's true," said Saltash. "I imagine she is fairly quick to
pick up anything, but I haven't known her myself for long."

"She must have picked up a good deal on _The Night Moth_," observed Maud
unexpectedly.

He glanced at her again. "Why do you say that? She was under my
protection--and Larpent's--on _The Night Moth_."

"I know. She idolizes you," Maud smiled at him somewhat dubiously. "But
she must have mixed fairly freely with the crew to have picked up the
really amazing language she sometimes uses."

Saltash's brows worked whimsically. "Some of us have a gift that way," he
remarked. "Your worthy Jake, for instance--"

"Oh, Jake is a reformed character," she interrupted. "He hardly ever lets
himself go now-a-days. And he won't allow it from Bunny. But Toby--Toby
never seems to know the good from the bad."

"Has Jake taken her in hand?" asked Saltash with a chuckle.

"Oh yes. He checks her at every turn. I must say she takes it very
sweetly, even offered to take her meals in her room yesterday when he was
rather down on her. It absolutely disarmed Jake of course. What could he
say?"

"Yes, she's a disarming monkey certainly," agreed Saltash. "But I never
was great on the management and discipline of children. So she knocks
under to the great Jake, does she?"

"Oh, not entirely." Maud laughed a little. "Only this morning they had a
battle. I don't know how it is going to end yet. But--she can be very
firm."

"She never tried any battles with me," said Saltash, with some
complacence.

"No. But then your sense of duty is more elastic than Jake's. You
never--probably--asked her to do anything she didn't want to do."

"Can't remember," said Saltash. "What did Jake want?"

Maud's smile lingered. "You'll laugh of course. But Jake is quite right,
whatever you do. He wanted her to go to church with little Eileen and me
this morning. She's only a child, you know, and he naturally took it for
granted that she was going. We both did. But just at the last moment she
absolutely refused, told him quite frankly that she was--an atheist."

Saltash's laugh had a sound half-mocking, half-exultant. "What said the