The Honorable Percival

								

Her eyes clouded.
"Why, I thought--I thought you were some one I knew. Is this your chair?"
"It is. Pray do not discommode yourself?"
"That is all right," she answered, trying to disentangle her high heels
from his rug. "I've had my nap, thank you. Think I'll go down and get a
sandwich."
Percival waited in frigid silence until she had departed; then he sank
limply into the warm nest she had just left, and closed his eyes on a
world that failed in all respects to give satisfaction.

II
A COUNTER-IRRITANT

If there is a place on earth where one meets with the present face
to face, it is on shipboard. Whether salt water and sea air act as a
narcotic on memories of the past and dreams of the future has never been
proved, but it is undeniably true that at sea time becomes a static
thing and concerns itself solely with the affairs of the moment.
During that first long afternoon Percival slept; and if the faithless
Hortense essayed to haunt his dreams, she was drowned in the profundity
of his slumber. It was not until his valet touched his arm and
respectfully submitted the information that the first gong had sounded
for dinner that he woke to the fact that the Saluria was still
swinging from the trough to the summit of increasingly high waves and
that the deck was virtually deserted.
"If you are not feeling quite the thing, sir," said the valet,
solicitously, "shall I serve your dinner on deck, sir?"
Instantly Percival rose.
"By no means," he said coldly. "Get me a sherry and bitters. I'll dress
at once."
Proud indifference to every passing sensation was manifest in each
detail of his careful toilet when he took his place at the captain's
table some twenty minutes later. With a haughty inclination of the head,
he seated himself and, apparently unaware of the glances cast upon him,
devoted himself to an absorbed perusal of the menu. He was quite used to
being looked at; in fact, he suffered the admiration of the public with
noble tolerance: only it must keep its distance; he could have no
presuming.
On his arrival the conversation suffered a sudden chill; but the
captain, who knew the signs of approaching icebergs, soon steered the
talk back into warm waters. It was evident that the captain was in the
habit of occupying the center of the stage, a fact which should have
gratified Percival, inasmuch as it focused attention at the far end
of the table. Strange to say, he was not gratified. He conceived an
immediate dislike for the large, good-looking officer, who seemed built
especially to show off his smart uniform, and who brazenly ignored all
conventions save those of navigation, His peculiarities of speech, which
at another time might have gratified Percival and confirmed the report
he was bearing back to England that Americans were, if possible, more
obnoxious at home than abroad, now jarred upon him grievously. He found
it difficult to follow the story that was causing the present merriment.