Summary

1 – The author writes of being taken on a trip by her mother, along with her brother, to see the Captain in Egypt. She writes of the long sea voyage, of their eventual arrival in Cairo, and how upset they became because plans that had been made for them had fallen through, leaving them abandoned. The author writes that the Captain finally arrived a week late, and showed his family proudly around Egypt.

These recollections are juxtaposed with the author’s recollections of reunions at home between her mother and the Captain, which were often too short (she says) for the author to re-establish any kind of relationship with him, but which were often enriched by his colorful stories. She also writes of feeling abandoned by the Captain in general, not just in Cairo: “If he loved us, if he...