"But I went down at last. And the girl Pollyni met me in the corridor below. She said: 'Are you going on board the ship?' 'Yes,' I answered, 'I am going on board the ship. What else can I do?' She shrugged her shoulders and looked at the floor. I started to go out. I experienced a sudden irritable anger.
"'Well,' she said in a low tone, 'you know her father is sick.'
"'Oh,' I answered, 'I will come ashore again, of course. But just now, you understand, I must go back. I may be wanted.' And I went out quickly into the chill air of the dawn.
"And the intense silence of that cold, closed, steep street daunted me. I felt, as I surveyed those silent and repellent façades, with their enigmatic shutters, a sensation of extraordinary loneliness and dreary failure. I envisaged the _Manola_ lying snug and respectable at her berth in the little harbour, all the dingy details of her stark utility apparent in the transparent morning air. I saw myself ascending the gangway, and the startled air of amused surprise on the face of the night watchman projected abruptly from the gallery. I saw Jack, asleep in his room, his mouth open, his limbs flung wide, his hairy chest showing through the open pajamas, a rumbling snore filling the neat room. And I came to the singular and illogical conviction that if I went aboard immediately I would regret it. I should carry away with me into the future a memory of shabby and furtive behaviour. And I did not want that, I can assure you. I wanted this thing to remain somewhat as I had experienced it. I felt that I must make the most of it. We grow very humble in our emotional demands as we grow older, I observe. We who go to sea especially. One of the inevitable products of our rolling existence. And I stood, irresolute, in front of the open doorway leading to the flat above, and Pollyni Sarafov stood there watching me. She came down.
"'Let me tell you something,' she began. 'I think you ought to go and see her father. Didn't you say you used to know him in America? Just think! She was all he had.'
"'What am I to say to him if I go?' I demanded. 'You know very well that he thinks she is ... eh? How shall I explain when I come in?'
"'Never mind that,' she said, shaking her head. 'You come.'