ts, while
others were hastening to take their seats within it. The passengers,
getting wind of some excitement, were hurrying sternwards, and he
pushed along with them, glad to forget his sore feelings for a minute.

Carnegie, followed by Dwight, pushed past him, alert and eager, and he
saw the twins with a group of ladies, watching with all their eyes.
Even his own chum, Donelson, was chatting at ease with two East Indian
officials, absorbed and forgetful. Tom Allyne felt decidedly left out,
and it was not a pleasant sensation to one who had been accustomed to
considering himself a good fellow and desirable companion.

He leaned against the bulwark, a lonely figure in the midst of all this
lively bustle, and wished impotently that he could have let well enough
alone--and by well enough he doubtless meant both the champagne and
Mrs. Campbell--thus preserving the pleasant relations of yesterday. A
steamship soon becomes the world itself to its passengers, and the
little events of each day assume an exaggerated importance. To be at
odds with one's fellows on board means a rather desolate position for
the young person fond of society, and this one moodily wished the
miserable voyage over as he blinked in the sunshine, with his back to
the rest.

The dingey, with its human freight, was smoothly lowered to the water's
edge, and rowed swiftly away, the captain, standing straight and tall
in the stern, turning back to touch his cap with a smile, as the cheers
resounded, but his eyes were upon two young faces who forgot to wave
handkerchiefs, even, so absorbed were they to catch his slightest
glance. The boat looked a slender thing to breast the might of that
great sea, if only half aroused, and though it was far from heavy
to-day an occasional puff of wind sent the waves up in little swirls of
foam, and seemed ready to drown it in spray. As the fires were banked
to stay the ship's course, the swarthy Seedees swarmed out for a breath
of air, and all who could find a glass, among crew or passengers, were
looking towards one spot. They could distinguish the floating hulk
with the naked eye, but only those with powerful lenses could say
positively that there seemed no life about it. After watching the
dingey until it melted into the outlines of the larger hull, they
formed into groups beneath the awnings, to speculate upon this wreck
and to hear yarns of others, each more thrilling than the last, till
the sisters began