“I fancy that’s the idea,” said Joan. “What will you do if you fail? Go back to China?”
“Yes,” he answered. “And take her with me. Poor little girl.”
Joan rather resented his tone.
“We are not all alike,” she remarked. “Some of us are quite sane.”
He looked straight into her eyes. “You are,” he said. “I have been reading your articles. They are splendid. I’m going to help.”
“How can you?” she said. “I mean, how will you?”
“Shipping is my business,” he said. “I’m going to help sailor men. See that they have somewhere decent to go to, and don’t get robbed. And then there are the Lascars, poor devils. Nobody ever takes their part.”
“How did you come across them?” she asked. “The articles, I mean. Did Flo give them to you?”
“No,” he answered. “Just chance. Caught sight of your photo.”
“Tell me,” she said. “If it had been the photo of a woman with a bony throat and a beaky nose would you have read them?”