She shook her head and answered in a low voice, as though speaking with difficulty. ‘No, I often cough, but chiefly during the night. Do not tell mother of this attack.’ One might have imagined her cough noisy and distressing enough to win the attention of everybody upon deck, and that nobody heeded it, unless it was the sailor who stood a little distance behind us grasping the wheel, was because, whilst Alice was coughing the passengers had left their seats, had thrown down their books or work, had forsaken their game of deck quoits to crowd about the head of the ladder on the right-hand side of the deck--the ladder that conducted from the poop on to the quarterdeck below. I was too much grieved and concerned by Alice’s attack to notice this movement of the passengers; but now that she had recovered and was able to speak and get her breath freely, I looked at the people and wondered what had drawn them in a body to that particular part of the deck. ‘Can an accident have happened?’ said I. ‘Will you go and see what is the matter, dear?’ exclaimed Alice. I at once arose and walked along the deck, keeping on the side opposite that which was thronged with the passengers. When I arrived at the brass rail that protected the extremity of the deck, I looked over and saw a great crowd of emigrants gathered about the central mast and hatchway. They grinned and elbowed amongst themselves as they stared at the concourse of passengers upon the poop. Half-way up the ladder on that side stood the swarthy fierce-looking gipsy, who had ejaculated on catching sight of my face when I first came on board, and who had watched me with eyes of fire when I had walked the deck with Mrs. Lee. She appeared to be haranguing the passengers on the poop. Her voice was a peculiar whine, and she showed a set of white strong teeth as she grinned up at them. Fearing if she saw me that she would point or call, or in some way direct attention to me, I returned to Alice, seated myself at her side, and told her what I had seen. After a few minutes the crowd of passengers at the head of the poop-ladder drew back, so as to allow the gipsy woman to step on to the deck. The whole mob, with the fierce-looking woman in the heart of them, then came surging to the skylight lying nearest to the edge of the poop, and here all the people halted, with the woman still in the thick of them. Mr. Harris hovered on the skirts of the crowd, taking a peep now and again over one or another’s shoulder with his acid, dry, twisted face; and great was the curiosity of the poor emigrants; for unheeded, or at least unrebuked by the mate, they thronged the poop-ladder on either hand to look on and hear what was said.