“But, my dear young lady, so far as I know, I never took hold of you.”

“If you please, you did—­going up the stairs.  I have blue marks as the result.”

The chatter ran on for a while in a similar strain.  Frederick, without betraying it, was on the alert for every word she uttered, noted every play of feature, watched for her glances, for the rise and fall of her lashes.  He jealously studied the others, too, and caught every expression, every movement, every glance that was meant for her.  He even noticed how Max Pander, the handsome cabin-boy, still standing at his post, held his eyes fixed upon her, a broad smile on his lips.

Ingigerd’s pleasure in receiving the homage of three men and being the centre of general interest was evident.  She plucked at her little doll and her odd, checked jacket, and gave herself up to coquettish whimsies.  Her affected voice filled Frederick with the delight of a long, cool drink to a thirsty man.  At the same time, his whole being was inflamed with jealousy.  The first mate, Von Halm, a magnificent young man of twenty-eight, a perfect tower of a man, joined the group and was favoured by Ingigerd with looks and pointed remarks, which indicated to her admirers that this weather-tanned officer was not an object of indifference to her.

“How many miles, Lieutenant, since we left the Needles?” asked Achleitner, who was pale and evidently chilly.

“We’re making better time now,” Von Halm replied; “but for the last twenty-two or twenty-three hours, we haven’t made more than two hundred miles.”

“At that rate it will take two weeks to reach New York,” cried Hans Fuellenberg, somewhat too forwardly, from where he was sitting a little distance away.  He was still flirting with the English lady from Southampton; but now, irresistibly drawn to Mara’s sphere, he jumped up and left her, bringing the tone that was agreeable to Mara and all her admirers, except Frederick von Kammacher.  The jolliness of the little group communicated itself to the rest of the promenade deck.

Disgusted with the orgy of banality, Frederick moved off to be alone with his thoughts.  The deck, which in the middle of the day had been dripping with water, was now quite dry.  He walked to the stern and looked out over the broad, foaming wake.  He heaved a deep breath of joy at the thought that he was no longer in the narrow spell of the little female demon.  Suddenly the long tension of his soul relaxed.  Though he might have suffered a profound disenchantment, yet he felt as if he had taken a sobering bath, which left him a free agent, alone with his own soul.  He felt ashamed of his instability.  His passion for that little person seemed ridiculous, and he covertly beat his breast and rapped his forehead with his knuckles as if to awaken himself from a dream.

But, finally, the great cosmic moment of the slowly setting sun cast its spell over the young German adventurer.