She gave him a tip that caught his breath, walked up the gang-plank of
the _Stella_, nodded easily to a severe official, and followed a pale,
neat stewardess to her state-room.

"Where is this boat going?" she asked of the pale stewardess, who
gasped and replied,

"South America, ma'am. Didn't you know?"

"I may have forgotten," said Molly, and then sleep overcame her and the
days and nights were one for a long time.

The _Stella_ carried hides and fruit and lumber, and, occasionally, two
or three passengers, for whose convenience the company had fitted up a
stateroom or two, since the demand for these proved steady. People, as
Molly learned from the stewardess (whose sole charge she was) for whom
a sea-voyage had been recommended for various reasons. There had never
been more than five at a time and two was the average; one, very common.

The long, blue days slipped by, she ate and slept and lay in the
deck-chair that had been sent by the party named Richards, and spoke to
the stewardess alone, who was used to tired and silent charges, and
served her meals on a tray.

She was a quiet, refined woman with a hand often at her heart. Molly
found her gasping in the companionway once, fed her quickly from the
little flask she pointed at in her pocket, and helped her to her berth,
as clean and comfortable as Molly's own. This produced confidences,
and she learned that Mrs. Cope (every one called her that, she said,
and treated her most respectfully) had made her first voyage as
children's nurse to an English family bound for Rio, who had turned her
off on arriving at that port. The stewardess on that trip proved
inclined to drink and sauciness, and at Mrs. Cope's suggestion they had
given her the post in her stead and she had kept it for five years. An
easy berth, she said, good pay, good board, little to do and pleasant
people. She ate alone, was practically her own mistress, and the
sea-air had saved her life, she knew.

This Molly could well believe, for she had come to count the days of
her ignorance of salt water for days of loss and emptiness. The
mornings of wind, the nights of stars and foam, the hot blue moons,
sang in her blood and tinted her cheeks: she felt herself born again,
the crowded past an ugly nightmare. She says that she had never, till
then, been alone with herself for ten years and that she had never had
time to find out what she really liked best in the world. We must
suppose that