I saw he was a man of prejudices. A substantial, well-weathered Briton, kind that founds empires and up with no nonsense I never faced keener eyes. He was nearer 50 than 40, but his dinner coat fitted a remarkably small waist, and his hair had almost no grey in it. He was tall with large hands, Yet not a fighter, after all, as I learned at that first meal. He was in the medical service, a surgeon, Next day Mme Albenez came down for lunch. I was at the table first, by the time the major arrived 1 and I were well launched on one of those shipboard intimacies. She was more than charming, she was magnificent—short, to be sure, with the Spanish figure, and some day she might be fat, but as yet she was graceful, pinkish white black-haired, dark-eyed.
"The major came at last. He said Mite things, and seemed pleased while she and I chatted on, but when we were mounting to the deck afterwards, he pulled at my sleeve, "I've travelled more than You—I see you need warning." ""What against?"
Don't you recognize her, man? She's on all the boats of all the seas!
""What does she do?" I asked "Blackmail chiefly, with a little de-hate murder on the side, Don't be cäught in her room! If you walk her on deck, let it be always where some one will see you!"
I was too astonished to thank him.
"That evening Mme Albenez was ravishing. She wore a white gown with a slash of red in it, one of those bold effects a Spanish woman can but your eyes were on the way her dress slanted over one arm and under the other. That lovely naked shoulder was something to dine next tol Her recklessness took my breath away. She was telling the world how
I tried to imitate him, but I was major was calm;.even gracious, she was.
afraid of her. I caught her studying me, and for an instant her eyes seemed snake-like,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.