y, and that the senator and
the general had been for some time with Hayle's twins. They could have
greeted every cabin passenger by name. They knew who were filling the
places lately vacated at the ladies' table, whose was each ubiquitous
child selling tickets for the appointed "show," and whose each private
servant, however rarely seen: not such as old Joy merely, but the
senator's black Cato, the general's yellow Tom, Mrs. Gilmore's
theatrically handsome Harriet, or the nearly as white Dora of the young
lady from Napoleon. And they knew well that the non-delivery of those
messages was no fault of Hugh's.

Miss Ramsey was up, yes; but she had breakfasted in seclusion and was
then in a small under-cabin for ladies' maids, close beneath the main
one, rehearsing with Mrs. Gilmore and others. Gilmore had been coaching
them but was now momentarily out on the boiler deck. Through the
extensive glass of the cabin's front they could see him standing before
a knot of men: John the Baptist and the man with the eagle eye and the
man with the eye of a stallion and the man who knew so slap-bang that
the Hayles and Courteneys had all but locked horns when the _Quakeress_
burned. They were the only exponents of unrest out there and only the
actor wore an air both spirited and kind. No one in the office openly
kept an eye on the outer group. In there the gossip lingered on Hugh.
Hugh had plenty, it was agreed, of the Courteney stuff and something
besides which these four hoped was the very thing with which to meet
this new phase so plainly at hand in the Hayle-Courteney contest.

Suddenly the first clerk looked straight out on Gilmore, so obviously at
bay, and murmured to the cub pilot: "Go, bring him." While the cub went,
the clerk spoke on. Hugh, he said, would one day be the best-liked of
his name.

In kindly dissent the second clerk shook his head, but the first would
have it so. The liking might be slow coming, he allowed, because of
Hugh's oddities, but in the end men would like even the oddities.

The mud clerk named one as if he liked it: "When he's by himself he's
got the iron-est phiz----"

The second clerk laughed his appreciation. "And when he's poked up," he
said, "it gets ironer and ironer."

"It'll need to mighty soon," observed the first clerk.

"When he runs into Gid Hayle," said the second.

The actor came. His pleased manner was more thankful than inquiring and
he insisted on remaining outside the window sh