“Look at that ape,” observed Harry to his wife, who was watching the scene, half in amusement, half in terror; “he’s going into sky-blue fits apparently: of all absurd sights an angry foreigner is the most ridiculous. Do you see his moustaches?--they actually stand on end with fury, like the hairs on the tail of an excited cat. But see, the Don appeals to his mistress; the Countess will have to settle the affair _in propriâ personâ_.” This affair, however, was not to be arranged so easily; for the inflexible commissionaire proved as deaf to the entreaties of the mistress as he had shown himself to the threatenings of the man; and the Countess, if countess she was, having remonstrated to no purpose in a gentle, timid voice, looked helplessly round, as though she would appeal to society at large to aid her in her difficulty. “Poor thing! those men have frightened her; she looks ready to cry!” exclaimed Alice. “Harry, dear, do go and see if you cannot assist her--you understand how to manage those people so well; besides, they always attend to a gentleman.” Thus urged, Harry crossed the deck, and Alice saw him take off his hat and address the interesting foreigner; she bowed her head, and was evidently making a grateful answer; then Harry turned to the disputants, who both assailed him with a volley of words, upon which he first silenced Whiskerandos, then he exchanged a few cabalistic sentences with the commissionaire, and slipped a talisman into his hand, whereupon, with the celerity of some harlequinade trick, he changed into an amiable, obliging creature, only too anxious to please everybody, and went off, patting Whiskerandos on the back, and calling him a _brave garçon_, to assist with his own silver-absorbing fingers in conveying the Countess’s luggage on board. Then the Countess overwhelmed Harry with thanks, and Harry smiled benignantly upon the Countess, and they “talked conversation” for a few minutes; after which they both looked at Alice, and Harry with his best company manner on (which was merely his own natural manner _brushed smooth_), crossed over to her. “She is really a Countess,” he began, “and a very charming, refined style of young woman too. She wants to be introduced to you, so come along.” “But, Harry, dear, I shall break my neck, or tumble into the sea, if I attempt to walk; just look how its rolling about!” remonstrated Alice, whose essentially terrestrial education had given her rather a horror of all nautical matters. “We’ll fall in together then,” returned Harry, laughing; “at all events don’t let us fall out about it. Come along, little wife, and trust yourself to me; I’ve paced a vessel’s deck when the sea’s shown rather a different sort of surface from that which it wears to-day.” As he spoke, he placed his arm round his wife’s slender waist, and half supported, half led her across the deck in safety. “What is her name, Harry?” inquired Alice, as they were effecting the transit.