“Yes, quite sure.  He’ll be quite safe.  Where’s your nighty?”

He darted into Number 15 and came back with a minute bundle.

“I don’t have to have nighties now.  Gran said I was grown up now I was coming to Australia.  So I wear pyjamas, made out of the same stuff as Dad’s,” he explained, undressing hurriedly and putting them on with considerable pride.  “Last night was the first time I wore them.  Only Daddy never looked, with those other men there.”

A lump came into Marcella’s throat as he neatly folded his clothes and laid them in a heap on the floor.

“There’s a pocket, look!” he said, afraid that she would miss any of the proud points of his pyjamas.  “Gran put a silver sixpence in it, for luck, and a little letter.  But I can’t read yet.”

He fumbled in the pocket which was just big enough for his hand.  There was the sixpence and a little handkerchief with rabbits sitting perkily at each corner.  The letter was a small text-card with a bright rosebud painted on it.

“Read it,” he said, watching her anxiously.  “Granny read it to me when she put it there.”

“Call upon me in the time of trouble,” she read.  He nodded.

“That’s right.  Now put it back.  Gran said I must never lose it, and some day if I remembered it, it might come in handy.”

She tucked it safely away and he started to climb into bed.

“Jimmy, I always get washed before bed, don’t you?” she suggested.

“Oh yes.  I promised Gran.  But it’s hard to remember everything,” he said resignedly.  But his washing was not very comprehensive; Marcella promised herself a busy half-hour with him in the bathroom next morning.

He was asleep in two minutes, but Marcella did not attempt to undress for a long time.  She dragged the cabin trunk out from under the bunk very quietly, and, sitting down on it, frowned.  A queer thing had happened to her.  Over all her early life her father had towered like a Colossus.  The rest of the world had been filled with friends—­friendly visions, friendly people, friendly ghosts.  She had not met anyone unkind before.  Conditions had never been anything but unkind; she expected cold and hunger, hardness and discomfort.  But that people could be unkind to each other she had never realized.  Then had come Louis’s tale, which had horrified her, Diddy’s tale which had grieved her at first and then puzzled her as she saw how easily the image of the sick girl was replaced by that of a man who gave her meringues.  Ole Fred had frightened her:  Mr. Peters had at first seemed ridiculous and then cruel.  Most of the people on the ship seemed cruel, when she came to reflect about it.  Something cruel had happened that very morning.  She had noticed, when they came aboard at Tilbury, a very romantic figure standing on deck; he fitted in much better with her conceptions of travel in far lands than did the very respectable, commonplace fathers