to talk of it.

CHAPTER IV.

In the back-parlour of a bookseller's shop, between the Strand and
the Embankment, three persons sat at tea; the proprietor of the shop,
a gray little man with round spectacles and bushy eyebrows, his wife,
and a pretty girl of twenty or twenty-one. The girl apparently was a
visitor, for she wore her hat, and her jacket lay across the arm of
an old horsehair sofa that stood against the wall in the lamp's half
shadow; and yet the gray little bookseller and his little
Dresden-china wife very evidently made no stranger of her.
They talked, all three, as members of a family talk, when contented
and affectionate; at haphazard, taking one another for granted, not
raising their voices.

The table was laid for a fourth; and by-and-by they heard him coming
through the shop--in a hurry too. The old lady, always sensitive to
the sound of her boy's footsteps, looked up almost in alarm, but the
girl half rose from her chair, her eyes eager.

'I know,' she said breathlessly. 'Jim has heard--'

'Chrissy here? That's right.' A young man broke into the room, and
stood waving a newspaper. 'The _Carnatic's_ arrived--here it is
under "Stop Press"--I bought the paper as I came by Somerset House--
"_Carnatic_ arrived at Southampton 3.45 this afternoon. Her time
from Sandy Hook, 5 days, 6 hours, 45 minutes."

'Then she hasn't broken the record this time, though Dick was
positive she would,' put in the old lady. During the last six months
she had developed a craze for Atlantic records, and knew the
performances of all the great liners by heart.

'You bad little mother!'--Jim wagged a forefinger at her. 'You don't
deserve to hear another word.'

'Is there any more?'

'More? Just you listen to this--"Reports heroic rescue. Yesterday
afternoon Mr Markham, the famous Insurance King, accidentally fell
overboard from fore deck, and was gallantly rescued by a young
officer named Kendal"--you bet that's a misprint for Rendal--error in
the wire, perhaps--we'll get a later edition after tea--"who leapt
into the sea and swam to the sinking millionaire, supporting him
until assistance arrived. Mr Markham had by this afternoon recovered
sufficiently to travel home by the Boat Express." There, see for
yourselves!'

Jim spread the newspaper on the table.

'But don't they say anything about Dick?' quavered the mother,
fumbling with her glasses, while Miss Chrissy stared at the print
with shining