troke of noon. Most of the passengers were
aboard, but, as Mr. Greyne stepped out of his cab, and prepared to pay
the Maltese driver, a trim little lady, plainly dressed in black, and
carrying a tiny and rather coquettish hand-bag, was tripping lightly
across the gangway. Mr. Greyne glanced at her as he turned to follow,
glanced, and then started. That back was surely familiar to him. Where
could he have seen it before? He searched his memory as the little lady
vanished. It was a smart, even a _chic_ back, a back that knew how to
take care of itself, a back that need not go through the world alone,
a back, in fine, that was most distinctly attractive, if not absolutely
alluring. Where had he seen it before, or had he ever seen it at all?
He thought of his wife's back, flat, powerful, uncompromising. This was
very different, more--how should he put it to himself?--more Algerian,
perhaps. He could vaguely conceive it a back such as one might meet with
while engaged in adding to one's stock of knowledge of--well--African
frailty.

At this moment the steward appeared to show him to his cabin, and his
further reflections were mainly connected with the Gulf of Lyons.

Twilight was beginning to fall when, so far as he was capable of
thinking, he thought he would like a breath of air. For some moments he
lay quite still, dwelling on this idea which had so mysteriously come to
him. Then he got up, and thought again, seated upon the cabin floor.
He knew there was a deck. He remembered having seen one when he came
aboard. He put on his fur coat, still sitting on the cabin floor. The
process took some time--he fancied about a couple of years. At last,
however, it was completed, and he rose to his feet with the assistance
of the washstand and the berth.

The ship seemed very busy, full of almost American activity. He thought
a greater calm would have been more decent, and waited in the hope
that the floor would presently cease to forget itself. As it showed no
symptoms of complying with his desire he endeavoured to spurn it, and,
in the fulness of time, gained the companion.

It was very strange, as he remembered afterwards, that only when he had
gained the companion did the sense of his utter loneliness rush upon
him with overwhelming force: one of the ironies of life, he supposed.
Eventually he shook the companion off with a good deal of difficulty,
and found himself installed upon planks under a grey sky, and holding
fast to