on life-lines. When he was not submerged, he was trying to put his ship
right again; and when he became exhausted, one of his colleagues took his
place, to see whether, while escaping drowning, he could continue the
work of salvation. They all escaped, and the _Torrington_ put back to
Tampa for repairs, which her own engineers accomplished.

The demonstration was over, and Ferguson's story was lapsing into general
gossip. The party of men began to dissolve.

"Who do you think I saw at Tampa?" Ferguson asked Macandrew. "Old Purdy."

"What?" cried Macandrew. "Is he alive?"

Ferguson laughed. "Just about. What's he been doing? I thought he had
chucked the sea. It was in the Customs Office. I'd been there to make a
declaration, and in one of those long corridors there he stood, all
alone, with his hat in his hand, perhaps cooling his head. I hardly knew
him. He's more miserable than ever."

"Did he say anything?" asked Macandrew.

"About as much as usual. I didn't know him at first. He seemed rather
ill. The temples of that high forehead of his were knotted with veins.
It nearly gave me a headache to look at him."

Several of us were impelled to ask a number of questions, but Ferguson
was listening now, with the detachment of youth, to the end of a bawdy
story that two men were laughing over. This had already displaced Purdy
in his mind.