That business with the tea-tray is what very few others would have been capable of; and we mustn't forget that if it had not been for her--" "Oh yes," rejoined Mina, with a toss of her head, a little tired of the eternal repetition of this stock observation.

"She didn't know all the same that it was papa who was out there." It was a game of hypocrisy, thought out with no inconsiderable subtlety, that the handsome lieutenant was carrying on in this matter: under his apparently so entirely frank sailor-bearing there was hidden a real diplomatist.

By trumpeting about the town the service which Elizabeth had rendered them in saving the Juno, he had, one may say, forced his family to take her up, though to them he made it appear that public opinion left them no alternative.

On the other hand, he was uncommonly cautious in his attitude towards Elizabeth herself; for he knew he must win her without attracting the attention of his stepmother and sisters.
He believed he had made a sort of impression upon her; but at the same time he felt that he had a wild swan to deal with, that might at any moment spread its wings and fly away--there was such a strong, independent individuality about her.
In his home, however, she had become a different creature, scarcely to be recognised as the same Elizabeth,--so quietly did she go about, hardly conscious of his presence apparently--and so slavishly did she follow the directions of the mistress of the house.

This new aspect of her had put him in doubt for a while, but it was not very long before he satisfied himself that he understood what it meant; and that little affair with the tea-tray, that was set down to awkwardness by the others, had quite a different significance for him.