Even
the tramp steamer had not been seriously injured, though its injuries
were likely to be less easy of repair than those of the Meridiana.
"Still," as a passenger remarked, when she steamed into the dock at
Liverpool, "we might all be at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
this morning. Just think what columns there would have been in the
newspapers. Imagine Miss Vanderpoel's being drowned."
"I was very rude to Louise, when I found her wringing her hands over
you, and I was rude to Blanche," Bettina said to Mrs. Worthington. "In
fact I believe I was rude to a number of people that night. I am rather
ashamed."
"You called me a donkey," said Blanche, "but it was the best thing you
could have done. You frightened me into putting on my shoes, instead of
trying to comb my hair with them. It was startling to see you march into
the stateroom, the only person who had not been turned into a gibbering
idiot. I know I was gibbering, and I know Marie was."
"We both gibbered at the red-haired man when he came in," said Marie.
"We clutched at him and gibbered together. Where is the red-haired man,
Betty? Perhaps we made him ill. I've not seen him since that moment."
"He is in the second cabin, I suppose," Bettina answered, "but I have
not seen him, either.
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