sat at a table there, and offered my pass to the man nearest me.

It was the mate. He scrutinized the simple document at unnecessary
length, and with a gravity that was embarrassing. He turned up slowly a
large and weather-beaten sadness, with a grizzled moustache that curled
tightly into his mouth from under a long, thin nose which pointed at me
like a finger. His heavy eyes might have been melancholy or only tired,
and they regarded me as if they sought on my face what they could not
find on my document. I thought he was searching me for the proof of my
sanity. Presently he spoke: "Have you _got_ to come?" he said, and in a
gentle voice that was disconcerting from a figure so masculine. While I
was wondering what was hidden in this question, the ship's master entered
the saloon briskly. He was plump and light. His face was a smooth round
of unctuous red, without a beard, and was mounted upon many folds of
brown woollen scarf, like an attractive pudding on a platter. He looked
at me with amusement, as I have no doubt those lively eyes, with their
brows of arched interest, looked at everything; and his thick grey hair
was curved upwards in a confusion of interrogation marks.

He chuckled. "This is not a passenger ship," he said. "That will have
to be your berth." He pointed to a part of the saloon settee which was
about six feet forward and above the propeller. "A sou'-wester washed
out our only spare cabin, comin' in. There you are." He began to climb
the ladder out of it again, but stopped, and put his rosy face under the
lintel of the door. "You've got twenty minutes now. Get your luggage
aboard."

My bag was where it could not be reached in twenty minutes. Roughing it
may have its humours, but to suffer through it, as I was aware I must, if
I stayed, would more than outweigh the legitimate interest of a first