"I was steering, you know, and had let things go a bit, I suppose, under the stress of my thoughts, when I realized the boatman was calling to me and waving an arm. I collected my wits and looked round. There was a methodical sound of oars and in a moment a large boat loomed close to us and I saw the ghostly figures of the four rowers, their bodies rising to full height as they plunged their oars in deep and then fell slowly backward to the thwarts. And as the boat moved forward again in one of its long, rhythmical surges and the stern of her came into the faint radiance of our small lantern I saw a bent figure with a fez lean suddenly forward, grasping the gunwale with one hand and his coat collar with the other and stare at us with a fixed, crouching intensity that was familiar. I was perfectly certain it was M. Nikitos, and in the mental excitement of wondering what he might be doing at that hour in a four-oared boat, I was turning my own craft round in a half circle. I heard voices in the fog, the voice of M. Nikitos giving strident orders and hoarse growls of assent from the toiling boatman. The sounds died away and I became aware of other sounds close by, the long hiss and slap of the sea against masonry, and voices. Voices clamouring and protesting and calling aimlessly and interjecting unheeded remarks into other voices engaged in torrential vituperation. And then my boatman stood up suddenly, his tall form rising and falling into the fog like some comic contrivance as the swell tossed the boat perilously near the sea-wall, and uttered a sharp, monosyllabic comment. The voices ceased as though by magic, and a grave question came out of the invisible air, which my boatman, leaning out and laying hold of the stones, answered in a quiet and competent fashion. You must understand that I had not seen this man, yet he had already made that impression upon me. The whole business to me, a strange and somewhat exalted Englishman sitting in a reeling row-boat and wondering whether he was about to be dashed to pieces against the stones, savoured of a carefully rehearsed performance. And when a flight of balustraded marble steps came into dim view and a tall figure in silk pajamas, a fur overcoat, and a fez came slowly down into the light of our lantern I gave up and just waited for things to happen. Up above I could now descry the chorus which had been creating such an uproar, a motley collection of male and female retainers in various stages of undress, and holding a number of alarming looking weapons, standing in a row looking down at us in astonishment. And I was just feeling exasperated at being so completely in the dark because I could not understand a word these people were saying, when the tall bizarre person in the fur coat and pajamas leaned over and said: "'I understand you are an Englishman from one of the ships?' "'Yes,' I said. 'That is so. What is the matter, may I ask?'