In the meanwhile the talk proceeded among the other persons at the breakfast-table. Miss Lavinia addressed herself to Launce.     

       “Do you know, you careless boy, you gave me a fright this morning? I was sleeping with my cabin window open, and I was awoke by an awful splash in the water. I called for the stewardess. I declare I thought somebody had fallen overboard!”      

       Sir Joseph looked up briskly; his sister had accidentally touched on an old association.     

       “Talk of falling overboard,” he began, “reminds me of an extraordinary adventure—”      

       There Launce broke in, making his apologies.     

       “It shan’t occur again, Miss Lavinia,” he said. “To-morrow morning I’ll oil myself all over, and slip into the water as silently as a seal.”      

       “Of an extraordinary adventure,” persisted Sir Joseph, “which happened to me many years ago, when I was a young man. Lavinia?”      

       He stopped, and looked interrogatively at his sister. Miss Graybrooke       nodded her head responsively, and settled herself in her chair, as if summoning her attention in anticipation of a coming demand on it. To persons well acquainted with the brother and sister these proceedings were ominous of an impending narrative, protracted to a formidable length. The two always told a story in couples, and always differed with each other about the facts, the sister politely contradicting the brother when it was Sir Joseph’s story, and the brother politely contradicting the sister when it was Miss Lavinia’s story. Separated one from the other, and thus relieved of their own habitual interchange of contradiction, neither of       them had ever been known to attempt the relation of the simplest series of events without breaking down.     

       “It was five years before I knew you, Richard,” proceeded Sir Joseph.     

       “Six years,” said Miss Graybrooke.     

       “Excuse me, Lavinia.”      

       “No, Joseph, I have it down in my diary.”      

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