I thought he did so as I approached the gangway to the saloon, for he said: 

“Private cabin on main deck aft.”

Nervous as I was, I had just enough presence of mind to say “Steerage, please,” which threw him off the scent entirely, so that he cried, in quite a different voice: 

“Steerage passengers forward.”

I found my way to the steerage end of the steamer; and in order to escape observation from the few persons on the pier I went down to the steerage cabin, which was a little triangular place in the bow, with an open stove in the middle of the floor and a bleary oil-lamp swinging from a rafter overhead.

The porter found me there, and in my foolish ignorance of the value of money I gave him half a crown for his trouble.  He first looked at the coin, then tested it between his teeth, then spat on it, and finally went off chuckling.

The first and second bells rang.  I grudged every moment of delay before the steamer sailed, for I still felt like a prisoner who was running away and might even yet be brought back.

Seating myself in the darkest corner of the cabin, I waited and watched.  There were only two other steerage passengers and they were women.  Judging by their conversation I concluded that they were cooks from lodging-houses on “the front,” returning after a long season to their homes in Liverpool.  Both were very tired, and they were spreading their blankets on the bare bunks so as to settle themselves for the night.

At last the third bell rang.  I heard the engine whistle, the funnel belch out its smoke, the hawsers being thrown off, the gangways being taken in, and then, looking through the porthole, I saw the grey pier gliding behind us.

After a few moments, with a feeling of safety and a sense of danger passed, I went up on deck.  But oh, how little I knew what bitter pain I was putting myself to!

We were just then swinging round the lighthouse which stands on the south-east headland of the bay, and the flash of its revolving light in my face as I reached the top of the cabin stairs brought back the memory of the joyous and tumultuous scenes of Martin’s last departure.

That, coupled and contrasted with the circumstances of my own flight, stealthily, shamefully, and in the dead of night, gave me a pang that was almost more than I could bear.

But my cup was not yet full.  A few minutes afterwards we sailed in the dark past the two headlands of Port Raa, and, looking up, I saw the lights in the windows of my husband’s house, and the glow over the glass roof of the pavilion.

What would happen there to-morrow morning when it was discovered that I was gone?  What would happen to-morrow night when my father arrived, ignorant of my flight, as I felt sure the malice of my husband would keep him?

Little as I knew then of my father’s real motives in giving that bizarre and rather vulgar entertainment, I thought I saw and heard everything that would occur.