"I hope you'll have enjoyed the voyage."
She hesitated ever so little. "Yes, much more than I expected."
"Did you think it would be very bad?"
"Horrible, horrible!"
The tone of these words was strange, but I hadn't much time to reflect
upon it, for turning round at that moment I saw Jasper Nettlepoint come
toward us. He was still distant by the expanse of the white deck, and I
couldn't help taking him in from head to foot as he drew nearer. I don't
know what rendered me on this occasion particularly sensitive to the
impression, but it struck me that I saw him as I had never seen him
before, saw him, thanks to the intense sea-light, inside and out, in his
personal, his moral totality. It was a quick, a vivid revelation; if it
only lasted a moment it had a simplifying certifying effect. He was
intrinsically a pleasing apparition, with his handsome young face and
that marked absence of any drop in his personal arrangements which, more
than any one I've ever seen, he managed to exhibit on shipboard. He had
none of the appearance of wearing out old clothes that usually prevails
there, but dressed quite straight, as I heard some one say. This gave
him an assured, almost a triumphant air, as of a young man who would come
best out of any awkwardness.
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