"Too clever sometimes. I needn't ask if all goes well with you, Jake.
Your prosperity is obvious, but don't wax fat on it. Bunny now--he's as
lean as a giraffe. Can't you do something to him? He looks as if he'd
melt into thin air at a touch."
"Oh, don't be an ass!" protested Bunny. "I'm as strong as a horse anyway.
Jake, tell him not to be an ass!"
"No good, I'm afraid," said Jake, with his sudden smile. "Come inside, my
lord! The children are all flourishing, but in bed at the present moment.
The baby--"
"Oh, I must see the baby!" declared Saltash, turning back to Maud.
She laid a hand on his arm. "I will take you to see him after dinner."
"Will you?" He smiled into her eyes. "I shall like that. But I shall
probably want to shoot Jake when I come down again. Think it's safe?"
She smiled back at him with confidence. "Yes, I think so. Anyhow, I'm not
afraid."
"Come and feed!" said Jake.
They sat down in the pretty oak-panelled dining-room with its windows
opening upon the terrace and the long dim line of down. Saltash talked
freely of Valrosa, of his subsequent voyaging, of the wreck of _The Night
Moth_, but no word did he utter of the gift that had been flung to him on
that night of stars in the Mediterranean.
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