there it is!"

"Yes--and I suppose it has become an every-day affair to the operator in
there; it isn't wonderful to him any more. We forget how wonderful a lot
of things are, when we get used to them."

"How wonderful everything is," she corrected; "the sunrise, the
ocean...."

They sat for some time in silence, gazing out across the dark and
restless water, touched here and there with white, as a wave combed and
broke. Then Dan's gaze wandered to her face. Seen thus, in the dim
light, framed by her dark hair, it, too, seemed wonderful to him; there
was about it a mystic allusiveness, a subtle charm, far more compelling
than mere beauty ever is; her eyes had depths to them....

She felt his gaze upon her and turned her face to him and smiled.

"You may smoke, if you wish," she said. "I can feel that at the back of
your mind."

"I believe I _was_ thinking about it," Dan admitted, and got out his
pipe; but he had himself been scarcely conscious of the thought, and it
amazed him that she should have detected it. There was the flare of a
match, and he sat back again, exhaling a long puff. "Now," he said, "you
are going to begin my education. I am ready for the first lesson."

"How shall I begin?"

"I think an excellent way would be to tell me something about yourself,"
he suggested.

She considered him gravely.

"Are you really in earnest?" she asked.

"Indeed I am," he answered quickly, colouring a little under her
searching eyes. "Forgive me if I seemed not to be. And please begin in
any way you think best."

"I will tell you something about Poland," she said, "and then you will
understand a little what I and all like me feel for America. You know, I
suppose, that there is no longer any such land as Poland?"

"I know that Russia and one or two other powers divided it, about a
hundred years ago."

"Yes; but you cannot know what that division meant! The Poles were a
brave and patriotic people; they loved their country as few peoples do;
and all at once, great armies were flung upon them; they were
overwhelmed, and their country was taken away. They lost more than
their country: they lost their language, their history, their national
life. But in spite of it all, they remained Poles.

"I was born in Russian Poland, not far from Warsaw. From the very first,
I was taught that I was a Pole, not a Russian. But only at home, under
my own roof, could I be a Pole. The teaching of Polish was forbidden in
any sch