d soda, for me absinthe, at which Captain
Maturin, with the steady English sailor's suspicion of any other drink
than Scotch whisky, glanced disapprovingly. Jaffery, to give himself an
appetite for dinner, ordered half a litre of Munich beer.

"And now, Captain," said he genially, "what have you been doing with
yourself? Still on the Baltic-Mediterranean?"

"No, Mr. Chayne. I left that some time ago. I'm on the Blue Cross
Line--Ellershaw & Co.--trading between Havre and Mozambique."

"Where's Mozambique?" Liosha asked me.

I looked wise, but Captain Maturin supplied the information. "Portuguese
East Africa, ma'am. We also run every other trip to Madagascar."

"That's a place I've never been to," said Jaffery.

"Interesting," said the Captain. He poured the little bottle of soda
into his whisky, held up his glass, bowed to the lady, and to me,
exchanged a solemnly confidential wink with Jaffery, and sipped his
drink. Under Jaffery's questioning he informed us--for he was not a
spontaneously communicative man--that he now had a very good command:
steamship _Vesta_, one thousand five hundred tons, somewhat old, but
sea-worthy, warranted to take more cargo than any vessel of her size he
had ever set eyes on.

"And when do you sail?" asked Jaffery.

"To-morrow at daybreak. They're finishing loading her up now."

Jaffery drained his tall glass mug of beer and ordered another.

"Are you going to Madagascar this trip?"

"Yes, worse luck."

"Why worse luck?" I asked.

"It cuts short my time at Pinner," replied Captain Maturin.

Here was a man, I reflected, with the mystery and romance of Madagascar
before him, who sighed for his little suburban villa and plot of garden
at Pinner. Some people are never satisfied.

"I've not been to Madagascar," said Jaffery again.

Captain Maturin smiled gravely. "Why not come along with me. Mr.
Chayne?"

Jaffery's eyes danced and his smile broadened so that his white teeth
showed beneath his moustache. "Why not?" he cried. And bringing down his
hand with a clamp on Liosha's shoulder--"Why not? You and I. Out of this
rotten civilisation?"

Liosha drew a deep breath and looked at him in awed amazement. So did I.
I thought he was going mad.

"Would you like it?" he asked.

"Like it!" She had no words to express the glory that sprang into her
face.

Captain Maturin leaned forward.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Chayne, we've no license for passengers, and certainly
there's no accommod