When the dinner was ended he made a stroke for the chance that he wanted. "Will you show me your boat?" he asked. "I'm a bit of a sailor myself, and I should like to see her very much indeed."  
"Oh, would you? I am so glad!" she answered eagerly. And then added more quietly: "It is a real pleasure to show you the Nixie. I am very fond of her and very proud of her. Father gave her to me three years ago—after he sold a lot over in West Superior. And it was very good of him, because he does not like sailing at all. Will you come now? It is only a step down to the wharf."
 
The Major declared that he must have his after-dinner pipe in comfort, and they went off without him—going out by a side door and[89] across a half-acre of kitchen-garden, still in winter disorder, to the wharf on the bay-side where the Nixie was moored. She was a half-decked twenty-foot cat-boat, clean in her lines and with the look of being able to hold her own pretty well in a blow.
 
"Is she not beautiful?" Ulrica asked with great pride. And presently, when Maltham came to a pause in his praises, she added hesitatingly: "Would you—would you care to come out in her for a little while?"
 
"Indeed I would!" he answered instantly and earnestly.
 
"Oh, thank you, thank you!" Ulrica exclaimed. "I do want you to see how wonderfully she sails!"
 
The boat was moored with her stern close to the wharf and with her bow made fast to an outstanding stake. When they had boarded her Ulrica cast off the stern mooring, ran the boat out to the stake and made fast with a short hitch, and then—as the boat swung around slowly in the slack air under the land—set about hoisting the sail. She would not permit Maltham to help her. He sat aft, steadying the tiller, watching with delight her vigorous dexterity and her display of absolute strength.[90] When she had sheeted home and made fast she cast off the bow mooring, and then stepped aft quickly and took the tiller from his hand. For a few moments they drifted slowly. Then the breeze, coming over the tree-tops, caught them and she leaned forward and dropped the centreboard and brought the boat on the wind. It was a leading wind, directly off the lake, that enabled them to make a single leg of it across the bay. As the boat heeled over Maltham shifted his seat to the weather side. This brought him a little in front of Ulrica, and below her as she stood to steer. From under the bows came a soft hissing and bubbling as the boat slid rapidly along.
 
"Is she not wonderful?" Ulrica asked with a glowing enthusiasm. "Just see how we are dropping that big sloop over yonder—and the Nixie not half her size! But the Nixie is well bred, you see, and the sloop is not. She is as heavy all over as the Nixie is clean and fine. Father says that breeding is everything—in boats and in horses and in men. He says that a gentleman is the finest thing that God ever created. It was because the Southerners all were gentlemen that they whipped the Yankees, you know."
 
[91]
 
"But they didn't—the Yankees whipped them."
 
"Only in the last few battles, father says—and those did not count, so far as the principle is concerned," Ulrica answered conclusively.
 
Maltham did not see his way to replying to this presentation of the matter and was silent. Presently she went on, with a slight air of apology: "I hope you did not mind my looking at you so much while we were at dinner, Mr. Maltham. You see, except father, you are the only gentleman I ever have had a chance to look at close, that way, in my whole life. Father will not have much to do with the people living up in town. Most of them are Yankees, and he does not like them. None of them ever come to see us. The only people I ever talk with are our neighbours; and they are just common people, you know—though some of them are as good as they can be. And as father always is talking about what a gentleman ought to be or ought not to be it is very interesting really to meet one. That was the reason why I stared at you so. I hope you did not mind."
 
"I'm glad I interested you, even if it was only as a specimen of a class," Maltham answer[92]ed. "I hope that you found me a good specimen." Her simplicity was so refreshing that he sought by a leading question to induce a farther exhibition of it. "What is your ideal of a gentleman?" he asked.
 
"Oh, just the ordinary one," she replied in a matter-of-fact tone. "A gentleman must be absolutely brave, and must kill any man who insults him—or, at least, must hurt him badly. He must be absolutely honest—though he is not bound, of course, to tell all that he knows when he is selling a horse. He must be absolutely true to the woman he loves, and must never deceive her in any way. He must not refuse to drink with another gentleman unless he is willing to fight him. He must protect women and children. He must always be courteous—though he may be excused for a little rudeness when he has been drinking and so is not quite himself. He must be hospitable—ready to share his last crust with anybody, and his last drink with anybody of his class. And he must know how to ride and shoot and play the principal games of cards. Those are the main things. You are all that, are you not?"
 
She looked straight at him as she as............