nge person's face, or the profile of a mountain against a
sky at sunset?) for the handsome steerage passenger looked at me a
long, long instant as if he were as much astonished as I was; and yet
with such a nice look, that instead of being annoyed, I couldn't help
being pleased.

In the meantime the little packet of money had fallen on the deck; but
though it had struck him from behind, he seemed to realise exactly what
had happened, and stooping down, he picked it up. Then he raised his
hand high, so that I could see he had the crumpled ball of paper in it;
and edging his way determinedly but not at all roughly, through the
crowd, he opened the parcel and gave the money to the conductor.

"What a splendid-looking man!" I said in a low voice to Mrs. Ess Kay.
"Isn't it extraordinary that he should be in the steerage?"

"Come away, my dear child," she answered. "I can't have you standing
here to be stared at by low creatures like that. The fellow's not in
the _least_ splendid-looking. He's only a big, hulking animal. Don't
take to making up romances about the steerage passengers, my love.
They're not worth bothering your little head about, because if they
weren't born for that sort of thing, they wouldn't be there, I assure
you."

I didn't say anything more, though I was vexed with her, both for being
so stupidly conventional, and for speaking to me in such a loud tone
that she attracted people's attention.

We went back to our deck-chairs, and there was nothing to remind me of
the little episode except the torn cover of my magazine, on which, I
now remembered, Sally Woodburn had scrawled my name over and over again
in pencil, just in idleness, while she and I had been talking that
morning. If Mrs. Ess Kay had known, no doubt she would have been
furious that a piece of paper with my name on it should have gone down
into the steerage. But I didn't mind, for I remembered that the young
man had opened the parcel, given the money to the conductor, and kept
the cover, which probably he had soon after thrown overboard, or
twisted up to light a pipe.

Nothing more happened that day; but there are two nice American girls
on board, about my own age or a little older (they _seem_ years older,
for they are so charming and self-possessed) and Mrs. Ess Kay encourages
me to like them, as they are in Mrs. Van der Windt's party. I grew
quite well acquainted with them the third day out, and they asked me to
go and watch the people