squeezes her hand tight.]

ANNA--Ouch!

BURKE--[Hastily dropping her hand--ruefully.] Your pardon, Miss.
'Tis a clumsy ape I am. [Then simply--glancing down his arm
proudly.] It's great power I have in my hand and arm, and I do be
forgetting it at times.

ANNA--[Nursing her crushed hand and glancing at his arm, not
without a trace of his own admiration.] Gee, you're some strong,
all right.

BURKE--[Delighted.] It's no lie, and why shouldn't I be, with me
shoveling a million tons of coal in the stokeholes of ships since
I was a lad only. [He pats the coil of hawser invitingly.] Let you
sit down, now, Miss, and I'll be telling you a bit of myself, and
you'll be telling me a bit of yourself, and in an hour we'll be as
old friends as if we was born in the same house. [He pulls at her
sleeve shyly.] Sit down now, if you plaze.

ANNA--[With a half laugh.] Well--[She sits down.] But we won't
talk about me, see? You tell me about yourself and about the
wreck.

BURKE--[Flattered.] I'll tell you, surely. But can I be asking you
one question. Miss, has my head in a puzzle?

ANNA--[Guardedly.] Well--I dunno--what is it?