commanded.

"Mrs. Darlington, dear, ye may as well resign yersilf to bein' looked
at," he retorted.

"It is good to hear your blarney and your brogue, Larry. By the way, old
Mrs. Van Dyke is aboard and demands a sight of you."

"Does she now? Come along and let's pay our respects to the old lady."

She put her hand through his arm, and they sauntered off, with the other
two men in their wake.

"Handsome woman, wasn't she?" Miss Watts remarked.

"No. I don't like that type. She struck me as _bold_."

Captain Larry O'Leary was the spoiled and petted darling of the boat.
The tale of his gallant action under fire, of his wounds, of his
decoration for valour, was passed from mouth to mouth, and lost nothing
in the retelling.

The men liked him because he was a simple, modest chap, in spite of it
all. The women followed him around like a cloud of gnats. He jollied
them all from old Madam Van Dyke, who was seventy, to the smallest girl
child on the boat.

He looked like a hero out of a fairy book. He had a rollicking,
contagious laugh, and a courteous heart toward every one. At the ship
concert for the benefit of wounded soldiers, he sang the songs of the
trenches, and the marching songs of the Irish troops, the English and
the French, in a clear baritone voice. There is no hope of disguising
the fact that Larry O'Leary was too good to be true. Like the star in
the melodrama, he was 99 per cent. hero.

His only rival for the centre of the stage on the brief voyage was
Isabelle. At first she kept to herself, because she was ill, and wanted
to be alone. But after a bit she grasped the fact that her aloofness was
a sensation, and she was not too ill to enjoy that. Her perambulations
about the deck were watched with undiminished interest. Everybody knew
everybody else. There were dances, and games and knitting contests, but
to all invitations Isabelle replied in the negative.

"Why don't you talk to some of these people, Isabelle? They seem very
pleasant," Miss Watts said.

"Oh," sighed the girl, "they bore me."

Captain O'Leary had made several attempts to get an opening to speak to
her in the afternoon, but she had successfully evaded them. Mrs.
Darlington in search of the bonny Captain spoke to her.

"Your handsome neighbour isn't on deck?"

"Isn't he?" said Isabelle. "I hadn't noticed."

Mrs. Darlington stared, laughed, retreated and the story went the
rounds. It amused O'Leary, and it also piqued him. He w