“Oh, very well; what shall we talk about? The end of the voyage? Well, I heard the captain say that we shall be at Queenstown to-morrow morning.”
“And we shall get off at Queenstown; do you hear?”
“At Queenstown? But why, when our tickets are for Liverpool?”
“Because I will it to be so!” said the man, in the sullen wilfulness of intoxication.
“Oh, very well! Quite right! So be it!” replied Lamia, with contemptuous submission.
And the discussion ended.
She loosened her dress and laid herself down on the lower berth to take an afternoon nap.
He sat on the sofa, with the brandy bottle before him, and drank and drank and drank.
That evening Gentleman Geff was much too drunk to go into the dining saloon, yet with the fatuity of drunkenness he insisted on doing so, and he reeled out of his stateroom and through the cabin and up the stairs. But had it not been for Lamia’s strong support he could never have reached his seat at their table. Lamia was like Burns’ Nanny:
“A handsome jaud and strang,”