s and might confine the disease to the lower deck. Was no physician
on the boat? No, one would be taken aboard in the morning. Of course you
could ask to be set ashore, but, all things considered, to stay seemed
wiser. Where was Madame Hayle? Few passengers knew, none of the boat's
"family" chose to tell, and at bedtime the majority "retired." So much
for the surface of things.

But beneath the surface--"Good God, sir! if any one is to go ashore, why
shouldn't it be _they_--the foreigners?"

For the full bearing of this speech let us recount certain doings in
this first half of the night. The Hayle twins, coming aboard at "Post
Forty-Six," had begun, by the time the boat backed away, to offer
exchanges of courtesy with such men on the boiler deck as seemed best
worth while, and this they kept up with an address which, despite their
obvious juleps, unfailingly won them attention. Even a Methodist bishop,
who "knew their father and had known his father, both stanch
Methodists," was unstintedly cordial. No less so was a senator.

"Know Gideon Hayle?" He had "known him before they had! Hoped to know
him yet when his sons should be commodores." Was on the _Chevalier_ when
the _Chevalier_ outran the _Quakeress_. One twin heard the tale while
the other brought the bishop.

"Senator, you already know Bishop So-and-So?"

"Senator, we'd like you to know Judge So-and-So, sir."

Judge, senator, and bishop were pleased. The senator reminded the judge
that they had met years before for a touch-and-go moment as one was
leaving and the other boarding the _Autocrat_--or was it the
_Admiral_--a Hayle boat at any rate--how time does fly! The brothers
took but a light part in the chat and were much too wise to betray any
degree of social zeal. Each new introduction was as casual as the one
before it. Sometimes they were themselves introduced but only those here
named stayed in the set. Chairs were found for four, and Julian,
stepping aside for a fifth chair, came upon another worthy, as well
juleped as himself and carrying his deck load quite as evenly.

"Bishop So-and-So, this is our father's boyhood friend, General
So-and-So. Judge So-and-So--Senator So-and-So--you both know the
general?" The general accepted Lucian's chair, and presently Lucian,
with two more chairs, brought one more personage, tall and solemn.

"Senator, have you never met Squire So-and-So?"

The senator had long wished to do so, the judge was well acquainted,