Yet she could not help wondering what o'clock it might be, so she just opened her eyes wide enough to look lazily through the lashes at the wee clock that ticked up in the skylight. Lo! the clock was not there. That was a skylight sure enough, but not Lotty's, and--why, surely it was moving, and everything else seemed moving, even her bed and her body. What a droll dream to be sure! Then the sound of voices close beside her, and the music of knives and forks and plates fell upon her ears, and the whole appeared to be very real. What could have happened? Where could she be? She remembered nothing. 'Wasn't it a blessing, mate, that you discovered that bit of a boat?' 'It was a 'tarposition of Providence, and that's what I calls it. God is ever kind, and those that has got to live He will bring again up out of the depths of the yawning deep itself.' 'That's so, mate; that's so.--How sweet and pretty the child looks asleep there. I declare, wife, I would like to go and kiss her.' 'Then why don't you, dear?' 'Well, Maggie, at present my mouth's about half-full of kippered herring, and it seems to me that kippered herring and kisses are not on the same quarterdeck like.' Lotty was beginning to think this surely could not be a dream, so she opened her eyes a very little way again and looked round her. She appeared to be inside a large German concertina, for this saloon was perfectly octagonal, but very cosily curtained and pretty, with plenty of pictures and photographs on the bulkheads. At the round table in the centre were seated four red people all looking her way--a rosy, motherly-like lady; a red-faced, good-natured-looking sumph of a lad, somewhat like Chops, but not so fat; a redder-faced, brown-bearded figure, jolly-looking, and dressed in blue pilot; and another man dressed similarly, the jolliest-looking and reddest of all--painted red by the sea every one of them, and by the spray of salt waves and the wild winds that had brushed their cheeks for many a long year. Perhaps the skipper's wife had seen the flickering of the child's eyes, for she got up now and knelt down beside the sofa, taking Lotty's hand. 'Are you better, darling? You've had such a nice sleep.' The bonny blue eyes were wide enough open now. 'It isn't a dream then?' 'No dream, little un,' said the skipper across the table. 'You are saved.' 'Oh, I don't like Salvation Army people,' cried Lotty; 'the band is vile. But this can't be heaven surely?' 'A long way off that port, my pretty. But you are saved, all the same, from a watery grave.' 'It were a 'tarposition of Providence, it were,' said the first mate. 'Hadn't been for the boy Ben, here, who is doin' dooty as second-mate, I wouldn't have seen Miss Mite. It's 'im ye've got to thank, little missie--nobut Ben.' 'And God,' said the skipper reverently. 'And God,' assented the mate.