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In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories

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IN A STEAMER CHAIR

AND

_OTHER SHIPBOARD STORIES_

BY ROBERT BARR (LUKE SHARP)

[Illustration: He played one game.] A PRELIMINARY WORD.

As the incidents related herein took place during voyages between
England and America, I dedicate this book to the Vagabond Club of
London, and the Witenagemote Club of Detroit, in the hope that, if any
one charges me with telling a previously told tale, the fifty members of
each club will rise as one man and testify that they were called upon to
endure the story in question from my own lips prior to the alleged
original appearance of the same.

R. B.



CONTENTS

IN A STEAMER CHAIR

MRS TREMAIN

SHARE AND SHARE ALIKE

AN INTERNATIONAL BOW

A LADIES' MAN

A SOCIETY FOR THE REFORMATION OF POKER PLAYERS

THE MAN WHO WAS NOT ON THE PASSENGER LIST

THE TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE OF PLODKINS

A CASE OF FEVER

HOW THE CAPTAIN GOT HIS STEAMER OUT

MY STOWAWAY

THE PURSER'S STORY

MISS MCMILLAN




IN A STEAMER CHAIR

THE FIRST DAY.

Mr. George Morris stood with his arms folded on the bulwarks of the
steamship _City of Buffalo_, and gazed down into the water. All around
him was the bustle and hurry of passengers embarking, with friends
bidding good-bye. Among the throng, here and there, the hardworking men
of the steamer were getting things in order for the coming voyage.
Trunks were piled up in great heaps ready to be lowered into the hold;
portmanteaux, satchels, and hand-bags, with tags tied to them, were
placed in a row waiting to be claimed by the passengers, or taken down
into the state-rooms. To all this bustle and confusion George Morris
paid no heed. He was thinking deeply, and his thoughts did not seem to
be very pleasant. There was nobody to see him off, and he had evidently
very little interest in either those who were going or those who were
staying behind. Other passengers who had no friends to bid them farewell
appeared to take a lively interest in watching the hurry and scurry, and
in picking out the voyagers from those who came merely to say good-bye.

At last the rapid ringing of a bell warned all lingerers that the time
for the final parting had come. There were final hand-shakings, many
embraces, and not a few tears, while men in uniform with stentorian
voices cried, "All ashore." The second clanging of the bell, and the
preparations for pulling up the gang-planks hurried the laggards to the
pier. After the third ringing the gang-plank was hauled away, the
inevitable last man sprang to the wharf, the equally inevitable last
passenger, who had just dashed up in a cab, flung his valises to the
steward, was helped on board the ship, and then began the low pulsating
stroke, like the beating of a heart, that would not cease until the
vessel had sighted land on the other side. George Morris's eyes were
fixed on the water, yet apparently he was not looking at it, for when it
began to spin away from the sides of the ship he took no notice, but
still gazed at the mass of seething foam that the steamer threw off from
her as she moved through the bay. It was evident that the sights of New
York harbour were very familiar to the young man, for he paid no
attention to them, and the vessel was beyond Sandy Hook before he
changed his position. It is doubtful if he would have changed it then,
had not a steward touched him on the elbow, and said--

"Any letters, sir?"

"Any what?" cried Morris, suddenly waking up from his reverie.

"Any letters, sir, to go ashore with the pilot?"

"Oh, letters. No, no, I haven't any. You have a regular post-office on
board, have you? Mail leaves every day?"

"No, sir," replied the steward with a smile, "not _every_ day, sir. We
send letters ashore for passengers when the pilot leaves the ship. The
next mail, sir, will leave at Queenstown."

The steward seemed uncertain as to whether the passenger was trying to
joke with him or was really ignorant of the ways of steamships. However,
his tone was very deferential and explanatory, not knowing but that this
particular passenger might come to his lot at the table, and stewards
take very good care to offend nobody. Future fees must not be
jeopardized.

Being aroused, Mr. Morris now took a look around him. It seemed
wonderful how soon order had been restored from the chaos of the
starting. The trunks had disappeared down the hold; the portmanteaux
were nowhere to be seen. Most of the passengers apparently were in their
state-rooms exploring their new quarters, getting out their wraps,
Tam-o-Shanters, fore-and-aft caps, steamer chairs, rugs, and copies of
paper-covered novels. The deck was almost deserted, yet here and there a
steamer chair had already been placed, and one or two were occupied. The
voyage had commenced. The engine had settled down to its regular low
thud, thud; the vessel's head rose gracefully with the long swell of the
ocean, and, to make everything complete, several passengers already felt
that inward qualm--the accompaniment of so many ocean voyages.

George Morris yawned, and seemed the very picture of _ennui_. He put his
hands deeply into his coat pockets, and sauntered across the deck. Then
he took a stroll up the one side and down the other. As he lounged along
it was very evident that he was tired of the voyage, even before it
began. Judging from his listless manner nothing on earth could arouse
the interest of the young man. The gong sounded faintly in the inner
depths of the ship somewhere announcing dinner. Then, as the steward
appeared up the companion way, the sonorous whang, whang became louder,
and the hatless official, with the gong in hand, beat that instrument
several final strokes, after which he disappeared into the regions
below.

"I may as well go down," said Morris to himself, "and see where they
have placed me at table. But I haven't much interest in dinner."

As he walked to the companion-way an elderly gentleman and a young lady
appeared at the opposite door, ready to descend the stairs. Neither of
them saw the young man. But if they had, one of them at least would have
doubted the young man's sanity. He stared at the couple for a moment
with a look of grotesque horror on his face that was absolutely comical.
Then he turned, and ran the length of the deck, with a speed unconscious
of all obstacles.

"Say," he cried to the captain, "I want to go ashore. I _must_ go
ashore. I want to go ashore with the pilot."

The captain smiled, and said,

"I shall be very happy to put you ashore, sir, but it will have to be at
Queenstown. The pilot has gone."

"Why, it was only a moment ago that the steward asked me if I had any
letters to post. Surely he cannot have gone yet?"

"It is longer than that, I am afraid," said the captain. "The pilot left
the ship half an hour ago."

"Is there no way I can get ashore? I don't mind what I pay for it."

"Unless we break a shaft and have to turn back there is no way that I
know of. I am afraid you will have to make the best of it until we reach
Queenstown."

"Can't you signal a boat and let me get off on her?"

"Well, I suppose we could. It is a very unusual thing to do. But that
would delay us for some time, and unless the business is of the utmost
necessity, I would not feel justified in delaying the steamer, or in
other words delaying several hundred passengers for the convenience of
one. If you tell me what the trouble is I shall tell you at once whether
I can promise to signal a boat if I get the opportunity of doing so."

Morris thought for a moment. It would sound very absurd to the captain
for him to say that there was a passenger on the ship whom he desired
very much not to meet, and yet, after all, that was what made the
thought of the voyage so distasteful to him.

He merely said, "Thank you," and turned away, muttering to himself
something in condemnation of his luck in general. As he walked slowly
down the deck up which he had rushed with such headlong speed a few
moments before, he noticed a lady trying to set together her steamer
chair, which had seemingly given way--a habit of steamer chairs.

She looked up appealing at Mr. Morris, but that gentleman was too
preoccupied with his own situation to be gallant. As he passed her, the
lady said--

"Would you be kind enough to see if you can put my steamer chair
together?"

Mr. Morris looked astonished at this very simple request. He had
resolved to make this particular voyage without becoming acquainted with
anybody, more especially a lady.

"Madam," he said, "I shall be pleased to call to your assistance the
deck steward if you wish."

"If I had wished that," replied the lady, with some asperity, "I would
have asked you to do so. As it is, I asked you to fix it yourself."

"I do not understand you," said Mr. Morris, with some haughtiness. "I do
not see that it matters who mends the steamer chair so long as the
steamer chair is mended. I am not a deck steward." Then, thinking he had
spoken rather harshly, he added, "I am not a deck steward, and don't
understand the construction of steamer chairs as well as they do, you
see."

The lady rose. There was a certain amount of indignation in her voice as
she said--

"Then pray allow me to present you with this steamer chair."

"I--I--really, madam, I do not understand you," stammered the young man,
astonished at the turn the unsought conversation had taken.

"I think," replied the lady, "that what I said was plain enough. I beg
you to accept this steamer chair as your own. It is of no further use to
me."

Saying this, the young woman, with some dignity, turned her back upon
him, and disappeared down the companion-way, leaving Morris in a state
of utter bewilderment as he looked down at the broken steamer chair,
wondering if the lady was insane. All at once he noticed a rent in his
trousers, between the knee and the instep.

"Good heavens, how have I done this? My best pair of trousers, too.
Gracious!" he cried, as a bewildered look stole over his face, "it isn't
possible that in racing up this deck I ran against this steamer chair
and knocked it to flinders, and possibly upset the lady at the same
time? By George! that's just what the trouble is."

Looking at the back of the flimsy chair he noticed a tag tied to it, and
on the tag he saw the name, "Miss Katherine Earle, New York." Passing to
the other side he called the deck steward.

"Steward," he said, "there is a chair somewhere among your pile with the
name 'Geo. Morris' on it. Will you get it for me?"

"Certainly, sir," answered the steward, and very shortly the other
steamer chair, which, by the way, was a much more elegant, expensive,
and stable affair than the one that belonged to Miss Katherine Earle,
was brought to him. Then he untied the tag from his own chair and tied
it to the flimsy structure that had just been offered to him; next he
untied the tag from the lady's chair and put it on his own.

"Now, steward," he said, "do you know the lady who sat in this chair?"

"No, sir," said the steward, "I do not. You see, we are only a few hours
out, sir."

"Very well, you will have no trouble finding her. When she comes on deck
again, please tell her that this chair is hers, with the apologies of
the gentleman who broke her own, and see if you can mend this other
chair for me."

"Oh yes," said the steward, "there will be no trouble about that. They
are rather rickety things at best, sir."

"Very well, if you do this for me nicely you will not be a financial
sufferer."

"Thank you, sir. The dinner gong rang some time ago, sir."

"Yes, I heard it," answered Morris.

Placing his hands behind him he walked up and down the deck, keeping an
anxious eye now and then on the companion way. Finally, the young lady
whom he had seen going down with the elderly gentleman appeared alone on
deck. Then Morris acted very strangely. With the stealthy demeanour of
an Indian avoiding his deadly enemy, he slunk behind the different
structures on the deck until he reached the other door of the
companion-way, and then, with a sigh of relief, ran down the steps.
There were still quite a number of people in the saloon, and seated at
the side of one of the smaller tables he noticed the lady whose name he
imagined was Miss Katherine Earle.

"My name is Morris," said that gentleman to the head steward. "Where
have you placed me?"

The steward took him down the long table, looking at the cards beside
the row of plates.

"Here you are, sir," said the steward. "We are rather crowded this
voyage, sir."

Morris did not answer him, for opposite he noticed the old gentleman,
who had been the companion of the young lady, lingering over his wine.

"Isn't there any other place vacant? At one of the smaller tables, for
instance? I don't like to sit at the long table," said Morris, placing
his finger and thumb significantly in his waistcoat pocket.

"I think that can be arranged, sir," answered the steward, with a smile.

"Is there a place vacant at the table where that young lady is sitting
alone?" said Morris, nodding in the direction.

"Well, sir, all the places are taken there; but the gentleman who has
been placed at the head of the table has not come down, sir, and if you
like I will change his card for yours at the long table."

"I wish you would."

So with that he took his place at the head of the small table, and had
the indignant young lady at his right hand.

"There ought to be a master of ceremonies," began Morris with some
hesitation, "to introduce people to each other on board a steamship. As
it is, however, people have to get acquainted as best they may. My name
is Morris, and, unless I am mistaken, you are Miss Katherine Earle. Am I
right?"

"You are right about my name," answered the young lady, "I presume you
ought to be about your own."

"Oh, I can prove that," said Morris, with a smile. "I have letters to
show, and cards and things like that."

Then he seemed to catch his breath as he remembered there was also a
young woman on board who could vouch that his name was George Morris.
This took him aback for a moment, and he was silent. Miss Earle made no
reply to his offer of identification.

"Miss Earle," he said hesitatingly at last, "I wish you would permit me
to apologise to you if I am as culpable as I imagine. _Did_ I run
against your chair and break it?"

"Do you mean to say," replied the young lady, looking at him steadily,
"that you do not _know_ whether you did or not?"

"Well, it's a pretty hard thing to ask a person to believe, and yet I
assure you that is the fact. I have only the dimmest remembrance of the
disaster, as of something I might have done in a dream. To tell you the
truth, I did not even suspect I had done so until I noticed I had torn a
portion of my clothing by the collision. After you left, it just dawned
upon me that I was the one who smashed the chair. I therefore desire to
apologise very humbly, and hope you will permit me to do so."

"For what do you intend to apologise, Mr. Morris? For breaking the
chair, or refusing to mend it when I asked you?"

"For both. I was really in a good deal of trouble just the moment before
I ran against your chair, Miss Earle, and I hope you will excuse me on
the ground of temporary insanity. Why, you know, they even let off
murderers on that plea, so I hope to be forgiven for being careless in
the first place, and boorish in the second."

"You are freely forgiven, Mr. Morris. In fact, now that I think more
calmly about the incident, it was really a very trivial affair to get
angry over, and I must confess I was angry."

"You were perfectly justified."

"In getting angry, perhaps; but in showing my anger, no--as some one
says in a play. Meanwhile, we'll forget all about it,"

and with that the young lady rose, bidding her new acquaintance good
night.

George Morris found he had more appetite for dinner than he expected to
have.


SECOND DAY.

Mr. George Morris did not sleep well his first night on the _City of
Buffalo_. He dreamt that he was being chased around the deck by a couple
of young ladies, one a very pronounced blonde, and the other an equally
pronounced brunette, and he suffered a great deal because of the
uncertainty as to which of the two pursuers he desired the most to
avoid. It seemed to him that at last he was cornered, and the fiendish
young ladies began literally, as the slang phrase is, to mop the deck
with him. He felt himself being slowly pushed back and forward across
the deck, and he wondered how long he would last if this treatment were
kept up. By and by he found himself lying still in his bunk, and the
swish, swish above him of the men scrubbing the deck in the early
morning showed him his dream had merged into reality. He remembered then
that it was the custom of the smoking-room steward to bring a large
silver pot of fragrant coffee early every morning and place it on the
table of the smoking-room. Morris also recollected that on former
voyages that early morning coffee had always tasted particularly good.
It was grateful and comforting, as the advertisement has it. Shortly
after, Mr. Morris was on the wet deck, which the men were still
scrubbing with the slow, measured swish, swish of the brush he had heard
earlier in the morning. No rain was falling, but everything had a rainy
look. At first he could see only a short distance from the ship. The
clouds appeared to have come down on the water, where they hung,
lowering. There was no evidence that such a thing as a sun existed. The
waves rolled out of this watery mist with an oily look, and the air was
so damp and chilly that it made Morris shiver as he looked out on the
dreary prospect. He thrust his hands deep into his coat pockets, which
seemed to be an indolent habit of his, and walked along the slippery
deck to search for the smoking-room. He was thinking of his curious and
troublesome dream, when around the corner came the brunette, wrapped in
a long cloak that covered her from head to foot. The cloak had a couple
of side pockets set angleways in front, after the manner of the pockets
in ulsters. In these pockets Miss Earle's hands were placed, and she
walked the deck with a certain independent manner which Mr. Morris
remembered that he disliked. She seemed to be about to pass him without
recognition, when the young man took off his cap and said pleasantly,
"Good morning, Miss Earle. You are a very early riser."

"The habit of years," answered that young lady, "is not broken by merely
coming on board ship."

Mr. Morris changed step and walked beside her.

"The habit of years?" he said. "Why, you speak as if you were an old
woman."

"I _am_ an old woman," replied the girl, "in everything but one
particular."

"And that particular," said her companion, "is the very important one, I
imagine, of years."

"I don't know why that is so very important."

"Oh, you will think so in after life, I assure you. I speak as a veteran
myself."

The young lady gave him a quick side glance with her black eyes from
under the hood that almost concealed her face.

"You say you are a veteran," she answered, "but you don't think so. It
would offend you very deeply to be called old."

"Oh, I don't know about that. I think such a remark is offensive only
when there is truth in it. A young fellow slaps his companion on the
shoulder and calls him 'old man.' The grey-haired veteran always
addresses his elderly friend as 'my boy.'"

"Under which category do you think you come, then?"

"Well, I don't come under either exactly. I am sort of on the middle
ground. I sometimes feel very old. In fact, to confess to you, I never
felt older in my life than I did yesterday. Today I am a great deal
younger."

"Dear me," replied the young lady, "I am sorry to hear that."

"Sorry!" echoed her companion; "I don't see why you should be sorry. It
is said that every one rejoices in the misfortunes of others, but it is
rather unusual to hear them admit it."

"It is because of my sympathy for others that I am sorry to hear you are
younger today than you were yesterday. If you take to running along the
deck today then the results will be disastrous and I think you owe it to
your fellow passengers to send the steward with his gong ahead of you so
as to give people in steamer chairs warning."

"Miss Earle," said the young man, "I thought you had forgiven me for
yesterday. I am sure I apologised very humbly, and am willing to
apologise again to-day."

"Did I forgive you? I had forgotten?"

"But you remembered the fault. I am afraid that is misplaced
forgetfulness. The truth is, I imagine, you are very unforgiving."

"My friends do not think so."

"Then I suppose you rank me among your enemies?"

"You forget that I have known you for a day only."

"That is true, chronologically speaking. But you must remember a day on
shipboard is very much longer than a day on shore. In fact, I look on
you now as an old acquaintance, and I should be sorry to think you
looked on me as an enemy."

"You are mistaken. I do not. I look on you now as you do on your own
age--sort of between the two."

"And which way do you think I shall drift? Towards the enemy line, or
towards the line of friendship?"

"I am sure I cannot tell."

"Well, Miss Earle, I am going to use my best endeavours to reach the
friendship line, which I shall make unless the current is too strong for
me. I hope you are not so prejudiced against me that the pleasant effort
will be fruitless."

"Oh, I am strictly neutral," said the young lady. "Besides, it really
amounts to nothing. Steamer friendships are the most evanescent things
on earth."

"Not on earth, surely, Miss Earle. You must mean on sea."

"Well, the earth includes the sea, you know."

"Have you had experience with steamer friendships? I thought, somehow,
this was your first voyage."

"What made you think so?"

"Well, I don't know. I thought it was, that's all."

"I hope there is nothing in my manner that would induce a stranger to
think I am a verdant traveller."

"Oh, not at all. You know, a person somehow classifies a person's
fellow-passengers. Some appear to have been crossing the ocean all their
lives, whereas, in fact, they are probably on shipboard for the first
time. Have you crossed the ocean before?"

"Yes."

"Now, tell me whether you think I ever crossed before?"

"Why, of course you have. I should say that you cross probably once a
year. Maybe oftener."

"Really? For business or pleasure?"

"Oh, business, entirely. You did not look yesterday as if you ever had
any pleasure in your life."

"Oh, yesterday! Don't let us talk about yesterday. It's to-day now,
you know. You seem to be a mind-reader. Perhaps you could tell my
occupation?"

"Certainly. Your occupation is doubtless that of a junior partner in a
prosperous New York house. You go over to Europe every year--perhaps
twice a year, to look after the interests of your business."

"You think I am a sort of commercial traveller, then?"

"Well, practically, yes. The older members of the firm, I should
imagine, are too comfortably situated, and care too little for the
pleasures of foreign travel, to devote much of their time to it. So what
foreign travel there is to be done falls on the shoulders of the younger
partner. Am I correct?"

"Well, I don't quite class myself as a commercial traveller, you know,
but in the main you are--in fact, you are remarkably near right. I think
you must be something of a mind-reader, as I said before, Miss Earle, or
is it possible that I carry my business so plainly in my demeanour as
all that?"

Miss Earle laughed. It was a very bright, pleasant, cheerful laugh.

"Still, I must correct you where you are wrong, for fear you become
too conceited altogether about your powers of observation. I have not
crossed the ocean as often as you seem to think. In the future I shall
perhaps do so frequently. I am the junior partner, as you say, but
have not been a partner long. In fact I am now on my first voyage in
connection with the new partnership. Now, Miss Earle, let me try a guess
at your occupation."

"You are quite at liberty to guess at it."

"But will you tell me if I guess correctly?"

"Yes. I have no desire to conceal it."

"Then, I should say off-hand that you are a teacher, and are now taking
a vacation in Europe. Am I right?"

"Tell me first why you think so?"

"I am afraid to tell you. I do not want to drift towards the line of
enmity."

"You need have no fear. I have every respect for a man who tells the
truth when he has to."

"Well, I think a school teacher is very apt to get into a certain
dictatorial habit of speech. School teachers are something like military
men. They are accustomed to implicit obedience without question, and
this, I think, affects their manner with other people."

"You think I am dictatorial, then?"

"Well, I shouldn't say that you were dictatorial exactly. But there is a
certain confidence--I don't know just how to express it, but it seems to
me, you know--well, I am going deeper and deeper into trouble by what I
am saying, so really I shall not say any more. I do not know just how to
express it."

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