"I should say a week, but that's merely an off-hand guess, as I suppose is the case with the estimate of an Italian physician."
"I hope your orders won't be too strict. By the way, has my luggage arrived?"
"It is all in the large room upstairs, but if you have any designs upon it, you are disobeying orders."
"I must get at a portmanteau that is in one of the bundles."
"I will fetch what you want, so don't worry about that, but come and sit on the verandah once more."
Stranleigh protested, and finally a compromise was arrived at. Miss Armstrong would whistle for Jim, and he would do the unpacking. She saw a shade of distrust pass over Stranleigh's face, and she reassured him that Jim was the most honest and harmless man in the world, except, perhaps, where sheriffs were concerned.
"Now," she continued, when he had seated himself, "you have talked enough for one day, so you must keep quiet for the rest of the afternoon. I will do the talking, giving you an explanation of our brigandish conduct."
"I shall be an interested listener," said Stranleigh, resignedly. "But permit me, before silence falls, to ask what you may regard an impertinent question. Do you smoke?"
"Goodness, no!" she replied, with widely opened eyes.
"Many ladies do, you know, and I thought you might have acquired the habit during your travels abroad. In that case, I should have been delighted to offer you some excellent cigarettes from my portmanteau."
"Poor man! I understand at last. You shall have the cigarettes in less than five minutes. Give me your keys, please."
"That particular piece of luggage is not locked. I am so sorry to trouble you, but after such a memorable dinner----"
"Yes, yes; I know, I know!" she cried, as she vanished.
"Interesting girl, that," murmured Stranleigh to himself, "and unusually accomplished."
He listened for a whistle, but the first break in the silence was the coming of Miss Armstrong, holding a box of cigars in one hand and a packet of cigarettes in the other.
"Then you didn't call for help, after all," said Stranleigh, a shade of reproach in his tone.
"Oh, it was quite easy. By punching the bundles I guessed what they contained, and soon found where the portmanteau was concealed. Now, light up," she continued, "lean back, and smoke. I'll do the talking. My father, as I've told you, is a very poor business man, and that is why I endeavoured to acquire some knowledge of affairs. He is generous and sympathetic, believing no evil of anyone, consequently he is often imposed upon to his financial disadvantage. Our position as father and daughter is the reverse of what is usual in such relationships. I attempt to guide him in the way he should go, and as a general thing he accepts my advice and acts upon it, but on the occasion of which I speak, I was at work in New York, and knew nothing of the disastrous contract into which he had entered, until it was too late.