said Bream Mortimer.

"Yes, nearly."

"No joke getting left behind."

"No."

"Have to take the next boat. Lose a lot of time," said Mr. Mortimer,
driving home his point.

The girl had listened to these intellectual exchanges with impatience.
She now spoke again.

"Oh, Bream!"

"Hello?"

"Do be a dear and run down to the saloon and see if it's all right about
our places for lunch."

"It is all right. The table steward said so."

"Yes, but go and make certain."

"All right."

He hopped away and the girl turned to Sam with shining eyes.

"Oh, Mr. Marlowe, you oughtn't to have done it! Really, you oughtn't!
You might have been drowned! But I never saw anything so wonderful. It
was like the stories of knights who used to jump into lions' dens after
gloves!"

"Yes?" said Sam a little vaguely. The resemblance had not struck him. It
seemed a silly hobby, and rough on the lions, too.

"It was the sort of thing Sir Lancelot or Sir Galahad would have done!
But you shouldn't have bothered, really! It's all right, now."

"Oh, it's all right now?"

"Yes. I'd quite forgotten that Mr. Mortimer was to be on board. He has
given me all the money I shall need. You see it was this way. I had to
sail on this boat in rather a hurry. Father's head clerk was to have
gone to the bank and got some money and met me on board and given it to
me, but the silly old man was late and when he got to the dock they had
just pulled in the gang-plank. So he tried to throw the money to me in
a handkerchief and it fell into the water. But you shouldn't have dived
in after it."

"Oh, well!" said Sam, straightening his tie, with a quiet, brave smile.
He had never expected to feel grateful to that obese bounder who had
shoved him off the rail, but now he would have liked to seek him out and
shake him by the hand.

"You really are the bravest man I ever met!"

"Oh, no!"

"How modest you are! But I suppose all brave men are modest!"

"I was only too delighted at what looked like a chance of doing you a
service."

"It was the extraordinary quickness of it that was so wonderful. I do
admire presence of mind. You didn't hesitate for a second. You just shot
over the side as though propelled by some irresistible force!"

"It was nothing, nothing really. One just happens to have the knack of
keeping one's head and acting quickly on the spur of the moment. Some
people have it, some haven't."

"And just think! As Bream was saying...."