ay in
his bed wondering how it was that the loss of an arm should make a
man feel lonely.

He was quickly about again. His body was clean from the bone out,
clean and hard, and he had never been ill. When the time came to take
a walk, he arrayed himself in shore-going black. It cost him an
infinity of trouble and more than an hour of the morning to dress
himself with one hand, but he would not have help. Then it was that
he discovered a strange thing; it was his right arm, the arm that was
gone, that hindered him. The scars of the amputation had healed, but
unless he bore the fact deliberately in mind, he felt the arm to be
there. He tried to button his braces with it, to knot his tie, to
lace his boots, and had to overtake the impulse and correct it with
an effort. When his clothes were on, he put his right hand in his
trousers pocket, then remembered that it was not there, and withdrew
hastily the hand he had not got. During the walk the same trouble
remained with him; it muddled him when he bought tobacco and tried to
pick up the change. Before he slept that night, he dropped on his
knees at his bedside, and folded the left hand of flesh against the
right hand of dreamstuff in prayer.

When his time came to go home in the Burdock, he was an altered man.
The quiet, all-observant scrutiny had gone, and the officers who
greeted him as he came up the accommodation ladder saw it at once.
Arthur Price was now in command, a breezy, good-looking captain in
blue serge and gold braid.

"You've got her, then, Arthur?" said the old man, as he reached the
deck and stood looking about him.

"Yes, I've got her," answered his son. "That your kit, father? Sewell
(to the chief mate), send a couple of hands to get that dunnage
aboard. Come along below, father."

He tucked his arm into his father's and led him down. Mildly taking
stock of the well-remembered surroundings, the old man noticed he was
being taken to the Captain's state-room, and an impulse of gratitude
moved him. But he was glad he did not speak of it when his son put
aside the curtains at the door for him, and he saw that this was not
to be his room. New chintzes took the place of his old leather
cushions; a big photograph of Minnie stood on the lid of the
chronometer case, and the broken-backed Admiralty guides, ocean
directories and the rest were reinforced by a brigade of smartly
bound novels.

"Sit down," said Arthur, "and make yourself at home till they get