"Oh, I don't really suppose there is," I said, managing to convey the idea, I am ashamed to say, that the catastrophe was a possibility.
She came over and seated herself beside me. I was very much ashamed of myself, but I could not repress a triumphant glance ahead at the other boat, where Kemper sat huddled forward, evidently bored to extinction.
Every now and then I could see him turn and crane his neck as though in an effort to distinguish what was going on in our boat.
There was nothing going on, absolutely nothing. The moon was magnificent; and I think the pretty waitress must have been a little tired, for her head drooped and nodded at moments, even while I was talking to her about a specimen of _Euplectilla speciosa_ on which I had written a monograph. So she must have been really tired, for the subject was interesting.
"You won't incommode my operations with sheet and tiller," I said to her kindly, "if you care to rest your head against my shoulder."
Evidently she was very tired, for she did so, and closed her eyes.
After a while, fearing that she might fall over backward into the sea--but let that pass.... I don't know whether or not Kemper could distinguish anything aboard our boat. He craned his head enough to twist it off his neck.
To be so utterly, so blindly devoted to science is a great safeguard for a man. Single-mindedness, however, need not induce atrophy of every humane impulse. I drew the pretty waitress closer--not that the night was cold, but it might become so. Changes in the tropics come swiftly. It is well to be prepared.
Her cheek felt very soft against my shoulder. There seemed to be a faint perfume about her hair. It really was odd how subtly fragrant she seemed to be--almost, perhaps, a matter of scientific interest.
Her hands did not seem to be chilled; they did seem unusually smooth and soft.
I said to her: "When at home, I suppose your mother tucks you in; doesn't she?"
"And what does she do then?" said I, with something of that ponderous playfulness with which I make scientific jokes at a meeting of the Bronx Anthropological Association, when I preside.
"She kisses me and turns out the light," said Evelyn Grey, innocently.
I don't know how much Kemper could distinguish. He kept dodging about and twisting his head until I really thought it would come off, unless it had been screwed on like the top of a piano stool.