"
"Whom do you mean by 'we'?"
"Well, there are plenty--on a ship like this."
"Then I think," I returned, "we won't."
"Maybe we won't have the chance," said the dreadful little woman.
"Oh at that moment"--I spoke from a full experience--"universal geniality
reigns."
Mrs. Peck however knew little of any such law. "I guess she's afraid all
the same."
"So much the better!"
"Yes--so much the better!"
All the next day too the girl remained invisible, and Mrs. Nettlepoint
told me she hadn't looked in. She herself had accordingly inquired by
the stewardess if she might be received in Miss Mavis's own quarters, and
the young lady had replied that they were littered up with things and
unfit for visitors: she was packing a trunk over. Jasper made up for his
devotion to his mother the day before by now spending a great deal of his
time in the smoking-room. I wanted to say to him "This is much better,"
but I thought it wiser to hold my tongue. Indeed I had begun to feel the
emotion of prospective arrival--the sense of the return to Europe always
kept its intensity--and had thereby the less attention for other matters.
It will doubtless appear to the critical reader that my expenditure of
interest had been out of proportion to the vulgar appearances of which my
story gives an account, but to this I can only reply that the event was
to justify me.
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