"Now I saw trouble ahead for Jack with Mr. Bloom on board. I don't pretend to have a very profound insight into human character, but I had an indefinable conviction that Mrs. Evans would look favourably upon Mr. Basil Bloom. Oh, no, I don't mean that my prurient mind was gloating over the destruction of Jack's marital bliss. Not at all. I never liked Madeline, but I do her the justice of proclaiming her inviolable chastity. What I mean is, I felt that she had more in common intellectually with Mr. Bloom than with us. He had a good deal of the fussiness of middle-aged shore-people, clearing his throat, coughing behind his hand, saying 'excuse me,' smoothing his hair with his palm, and referring to things he had seen 'in the papers.' And in spite of his inadequate sea-going gear, he invariably appeared in a more or less clean stiff collar. A woman, I mean a genteel woman, will never utterly condemn any man so long as he wears a collar. This would not have mattered save that Jack and I invariably abandoned collars as soon as the pilot had left. "So, when Mr. Basil Bloom, in a dirty gray lounge suit, brown Oxford shoes, a grimy collar, and a deer-stalker hat, bent over me and enquired if I had seen the arrivals, I shook my head and got up to walk away. But Mr. Bloom detained me. Had I not seen the nurse? Nice little piece of goods. And the baby was a little angel. Between me and him, he was good enough to say, we ought to have a very pleasant trip, what with ladies on board, what? And Mr. Bloom, settling his dirty collar and concealing a brilliant smile behind a hairy, ringed hand, walked off to superintend his neglected work.