"The price of the chair is one dollar."

"I haven't got a dollar."

The steward laughed as if to humor his passenger. "I'm afraid then
you can't have the chair."

"So I must stand up all the way to Panama, eh?"

"You are joking, sir. I'll have to pay it myself, if you don't."

"That's right--make me as uncomfortable as possible. By-the-way,
what size collar do you wear?"

"Sixteen."

Kirk sighed. "Send the purser to me, will you? I'll fix up the
chair matter with him."

While he was talking he heard the rustle of skirts close by and
saw the woman he had met earlier seating herself next to him. With
her was a French maid bearing a rug in her hands. It annoyed the
young man to realize that out of all the chairs on deck he had
selected the one nearest hers, and he would have changed his
position had he not been too indolent. As it was, he lay idly
listening to her words of direction to the maid; but as she spoke
in French, he was undecided whether she was telling her companion
that bad weather was imminent, or that the laundry needed
counting--his mind, it seemed, ran to laundry.