“Well—­he’s a—­no account cuss—­anyhow.  You just—­ask him.  That’s all.”

That new manner impressed me—­or rather made me pause.  But sanity asserting its sway at once I left the verandah after giving him a mirthless smile.  In a few strides I found myself in the dining room, now cleared and empty.  But during that short time various thoughts occurred to me, such as:  that Giles had been making fun of me, expecting some amusement at my expense; that I probably looked silly and gullible; that I knew very little of life. . . .

The door facing me across the dining room flew open to my extreme surprise.  It was the door inscribed with the word “Steward” and the man himself ran out of his stuffy, Philistinish lair in his absurd, hunted-animal manner, making for the garden door.

To this day I don’t know what made me call after him.  “I say!  Wait a minute.”  Perhaps it was the sidelong glance he gave me; or possibly I was yet under the influence of Captain Giles’ mysterious earnestness.  Well, it was an impulse of some sort; an effect of that force somewhere within our lives which shapes them this way or that.  For if these words had not escaped from my lips (my will had nothing to do with that) my existence would, to be sure, have been still a seaman’s existence, but directed on now to me utterly inconceivable lines.

No.  My will had nothing to do with it.  Indeed, no sooner had I made that fateful noise than I became extremely sorry for it.  Had the man stopped and faced me I would have had to retire in disorder.  For I had no notion to carry out Captain Giles’ idiotic joke, either at my own expense or at the expense of the Steward.

But here the old human instinct of the chase came into play.  He pretended to be deaf, and I, without thinking a second about it, dashed along my own side of the dining table and cut him off at the very door.

“Why can’t you answer when you are spoken to?” I asked roughly.

He leaned against the lintel of the door.  He looked extremely wretched.  Human nature is, I fear, not very nice right through.  There are ugly spots in it.  I found myself growing angry, and that, I believe, only because my quarry looked so woe-begone.  Miserable beggar!

I went for him without more ado.  “I understand there was an official communication to the Home from the Harbour Office this morning.  Is that so?”

Instead of telling me to mind my own business, as he might have done, he began to whine with an undertone of impudence.  He couldn’t see me anywhere this morning.  He couldn’t be expected to run all over the town after me.

“Who wants you to?” I cried.  And then my eyes became opened to the inwardness of things and speeches the triviality of which had been so baffling and tiresome.

I told him I wanted to know what was in that letter.  My sternness of tone and behaviour was only half assumed.  Curiosity can be a very fierce sentiment—­at times.