blue figures lounging about seemed to be
quite a long way off, indeed in another world. Here and there on the deck
were circles of yellow or white rope, coiled as precisely and perfectly as
Audrey could coil her own hair. Mr. Gilman led them to the door of the
deck-house and they gazed within. The sight of the interior drew out of the
ravished Audrey an ecstatic exclamation: "What a darling!" And at the words
she saw that Mr. Gilman, for all his assumed nonchalant spryness, almost
trembled with pleasure. The deck-house was a drawing-room whose walls were
of carved and inlaid wood. Orange-shaded electric bulbs hung on short, silk
cords from the ceiling, and flowers in sconces showed brilliantly between
the windows, which were draped with curtains of silk matching the thick
carpet. Several lounge chairs and a table of bird's-eye maple completed the
place, and over the table were scattered newspapers and illustrated
weeklies. Everything, except the literature, was somewhat diminished in
size, but the smallness of the scale only intensified the pleasure derived
from the spectacle.

Then they went "downstairs," as Audrey said; but Mr. Gilman corrected her
and said "below," whereupon Audrey retorted that she should call it the
"ground floor," and Mr. Gilman laughed as she had never heard a man of his
age laugh. The sight of the ground floor still further increased Audrey's
notion of the dimensions of the yacht, whose corridors and compartments
appeared to stretch away endlessly in two directions. At the foot of the
curving staircase Mr. Gilman, pulling aside a curtain, announced: "This is
the saloon." When she heard the word Audrey expected a poky cubicle, but
found a vast drawing-room with more books than she had ever seen in any
other drawing-room, many pictures, an open piano, with music on it; sofas
in every quarter, and about a thousand cupboards and drawers, each with a
silver knob or handle. Above all was a dome of multi-coloured glass, and
exactly beneath the dome a table set for supper, with the finest napery,
cutlery and crystal. The apartment was dazzlingly lighted, and yet not a
single lamp could be detected in the act of illumination. A real
parlourmaid suddenly appeared at the far end of the room, and behind her
two stewards in gilt-buttoned white Eton jackets and black trousers. Mr.
Gilman, with seriousness, bade the parlourmaid take charge of the ladies
and show them the sleeping-cabins.

"Choose any cabins yo