A porter was wheeling an invalid chair toward the gang-plank. By its
side walked a gentlewoman whom fanciful little Anne likened to a
partridge. In fact, with her bright eyes and quick movements, she was
not unlike a plump, brown-coated bird.

She fluttered toward the chair and said in a sweet, chirpy voice:
"Comfortable, Emily? Lean a little forward and let me put this pillow
under your shoulders. There, dear! That's better, I'm sure. Just a
little while longer. How nicely you are standing the journey!"

A man in rough clothes stopped to exchange parting words with a youth in
paint-splotched overalls.

--"Take it kind ye're here to see me off. I been a saying to mesilf four
year I'd get back to see the folks in the ould counthry. And here I am
at last wid me trunk in me hand--" holding out a bulging canvas bag.
"Maybe so I'll bring more luggage back. There's a tidy girl I used to
know--"

Beyond this man, Anne's roving eyes caught a glimpse of a familiar,
gray-clad figure. She waved her hand eagerly but it attracted no
greeting in return. Her uncle looked worried and nervous. Indeed, he
started like a hunted wild creature, when a boy spoke suddenly to him.
It was Roger, an office boy whom Anne had seen on the holiday occasions
when she had met her uncle down-town. Roger held out a yellow envelope.
Her uncle snatched it, and--just then there came between him and Anne a
group of hurrying passengers--a stout man in a light gray coat and a
pink shirt, a stout woman in a dark silk travelling coat, and two stout,
short-skirted girls with good-natured faces, round as full moons. The
younger girl was dragging a doll carriage carelessly with one hand. The