"Mention to him the name you used then. He will look up his list, and allot you the state-room you paid for. It is probable he may have the power to do this without exacting any excess fare; but if such is not the case, settle with him for your passage, and take his receipt. The money will doubtless be refunded at New York. Here is a fifty-pound note, and you can carry out the transaction much better than I. But stop a moment. Do you remember how much you paid for the room?" "Twenty-five pounds." "That will leave you only the remaining twenty-five for New York, which is an expensive place, so we must make the loan a hundred pounds. Leave me your address, and if you do not hear from your people before that loan is expended, you may have whatever more you need. You will, of course, repay me at your convenience. I will give you the name of my New York agents." The eyes had by this time brimmed over, and the girl could not speak. Stranleigh took from his pocket-book several Bank of England notes. Selecting two for fifty pounds each, he handed them to her. "Good-night!" he said hurriedly. "Good-night!" she whispered. After dinner on the day the liner left Queenstown, Lord Stranleigh sat in a comfortable chair in the daintily furnished drawing-room of his suite. A shaded electric light stood on the table at his elbow, and he was absorbed in a book he had bought before leaving London. Stranleigh was at peace with all the world, and his reading soothed a mind which he never allowed to become perturbed if he could help it. He now thanked his stars that he was sure of a week undisturbed by callers and free from written requests. Just at this moment he was amazed to see the door open, and a man enter without knock or other announcement. His first thought was to wonder what had become of Ponderby--how had the stranger eluded him? It was a ruddy-faced, burly individual who came in, and, as he turned round to shut the door softly, Stranleigh saw that his thick neck showed rolls of flesh beneath the hair. His lordship placed the open book face downwards on the table, but otherwise made no motion. "Lord Stranleigh, I presume?" said the stranger. Stranleigh made no reply, but continued gazing at the intruder. "I wish to have a few words with you, and considered it better to come to your rooms than to accost you on deck. What I have to say is serious, and outside we might have got into an altercation, which you would regret." "You need have no fear of any altercation with me," said Stranleigh. "Well, at least you desire to avoid publicity, otherwise you would not be travelling under an assumed name." "I am not travelling under an assumed name." The stout man waved his hand in deprecation of unnecessary talk. "I will come to the point at once," he said, seating himself without any invitation. "I shall be obliged if you do so." The new-comer's eyes narrowed, and a threatening expression overspread his rather vicious face.