the hurricane deck had ever seen them, but
he knew at once who they were and looked the closer on that account. The
self-oblivious elation with which the slim lass gave her eyes and mind
to everything except her own footing caused him to keep his chief watch
on her. He even beckoned a black deck hand to do the same. Wherever her
glance went her gay interest went with it, either in a soft
soliloquizing laugh or in some demonstration less definite though more
radiant; some sign of delight from her lips, her eyes, her brow, her
springing step, dancing curls, or supple arms. The youth on the roof's
edge deepened his frown. At a point on the stage where its sheer, naked
sides spanned the narrow chasm through which the waters swept between
boat and wharf, her feet strayed too near one perilous edge, and just
then her eyes went up to him. The two glances had barely met when she
tripped and staggered. With a dozen others aboard and ashore, he gave a
start. She sent him a look of terror, then turned from deadly pale to
rosy red and gasped her thanks to the smiling deckhand, whose clutch had
saved her life. The next instant she was laughing elatedly to her
horrified nurse, and so disappeared with her kindred on the lower deck
and front stairs.

The mellow boom of the third and last parting signal diverted the
general mind, and a glance behind him showed the youth the close and
welcome presence of that superior-looking man in answer to whose gesture
the pilot had tolled the earlier bell. But this person was closely
preoccupied. Now his capable glance ran aft along every marginal line of
the boat, now it dropped below to where the big stage lay drawn in
athwart the forward deck from guard to guard. Now he gave short, quiet
orders to wharf and forecastle, now a single word or two to the
pilot-house. Far below, the engine bells jingled. The bowline was in. A
yeast of waters ran forward from the backing wheels, the breast line
slacked away in fierce jerks, and the _Votaress_ began to depart.

Meantime there was an odd stir on shore. A cab whirled up furiously and
two more youths, shapely, handsome, and fashionable, twins beyond cavil
and noticeably older than their twenty years, visibly rich in fine
qualities but as visibly reckless as to what they did with them, sprang
out, flushed and imperious, to wave the _Votaress_. One of her guards
was still rubbing along the steamer beside her, but before the pair
could dash aboard this othe