"Yes," agreed Harborough. "But we won't stand here gazing aft. It's a little antipathy of mine. Why, I don't know. You read in books of people standing aft and watching the phosphorescent swirl of the propellers and all that sort of thing. Sentimental! I prefer to look for'ard and see what's ahead. There's precious little fun in taking life retrospectively. It's anticipation—call it hope if you like—that is the lodestone of life!"
"I wonder if you'll be of the same mind when you near the end of your journey," remarked Villiers.
"That I can't say," replied Harborough. "But, candidly speaking, would you care to go through the last five years again?"
"I had some good times," said Jack reflectively. "Perhaps I was lucky."
"Supposing you'd been a Tommy in the trenches?" prompted Harborough.
"Ah, that's a proposition," rejoined Villiers gravely. "I don't think I'd care for the idea. In fact, I feel certain I wouldn't. And I know dozens of fellows who've been and come back, and they are all of the same opinion—that it was a physical and mental hell. But if they had to start all over again, they'd do it."
"As a matter of patriotic duty," added Harborough. "We're a weird nation—slow to adapt ourselves to changing conditions, blunderers in war and blunderers in peace, and yet, somehow, we come out on top in the end. The Old Country's in a pretty rotten state just now, I admit, but in another twelvemonth or so things will begin to shape themselves. Eh! what's that?"
O'Loghlin, lightly clad, perspiring freely and reeking with oil, had come up from the motor-room and stood before his chief.
"We've a stowaway, sir," he reported.
Harborough knitted his heavy brows.