Her wrap fell to the ground, and he stooped to pick it up; she had
vanished. He threw it over his arm, and approaching the window squarely
he saw a monstrous form of a fat man in an armchair, an unshaded lamp,
the yawning of an enormous mouth in a big flat face encircled by a
ragged halo of hair--Miss Bessie's head and bust. The shouting stopped;
the blind ran down. He lost himself in thinking how awkward it was.
Father mad; no getting into the house. No money to get back; a hungry
chum in London who would begin to think he had been given the go-by.
"Damn!" he muttered. He could break the door in, certainly; but
they would perhaps bundle him into chokey for that without asking
questions--no great matter, only he was confoundedly afraid of being
locked up, even in mistake. He turned cold at the thought. He stamped
his feet on the sodden grass.

"What are you?--a sailor?" said an agitated voice.

She had flitted out, a shadow herself, attracted by the reckless shadow
waiting under the wall of her home.

"Anything. Enough of a sailor to be worth my salt before the mast. Came
home that way this time."

"Where do you come from?" she asked.

"Right away from a jolly good spree," he said, "by the London
train--see? Ough! I hate being shut up in a train. I don't mind a house
so much."

"Ah," she said; "that's lucky."