"Forgive me! I'm very rude."
"What's the joke?" he asked.
She answered him in a voice that still quivered a little with suppressed merriment.
"There isn't a joke. I—I often laugh at nothing. It's a silly habit of mine."
His moody silence seemed to endorse this remark. She became silent also, and after a moment made a shy movement to depart.
He turned then and looked at her, looked full and straight into her small, sallow face, with its shadowy eyes and pointed features, as if he would register her likeness upon his memory.
She gave him a faint, friendly smile.
"I'm going below now," she said. "Good-bye!"
He raised his hat abruptly. His head was massive as a bull's.
"Mind how you go!" he said briefly.