There flashed into my mind at that moment a memory from boyhood, forgotten through the years, of his father being largely interested in shipping, but it was futile, irrelevant, and left me as it came; then, while he sagged under my grip, there came to me the picture of Grace Morton's frightened face as she had turned it up to me in the lamplight. But I forced it from me. That love is dead, I thought, and I hissed the thought through my teeth with my curses. Then, thinking of the long, bitter years in prison, the suffering and the shame, the thwarted hopes and plans, the struggle to maintain my integrity for the sake of a girl that had forgotten me, and knowing only that the cause of it all was right here, in my hands, I felt what I had not felt before--the impulse, the desire, and the self-justification to kill. But I did not kill him. I relaxed my hold and looked into the same frightened face that had appealed to me once before. Older now, with lines of care and trouble in it, but more womanly and commanding. She stood in the dining-room door, and had commanded me to stop; and I obeyed her. Her brother slunk past her into the dining-room. The second mate was on deck, the steward had not come aft with the breakfast. The captain had not come through from the after cabin. None but the girl had seen the assault. "Go to your room, George," she called to him through the door. "Wait for me, and say nothing to the captain." Then she turned, and calmly regarded me. On my part, I stood before her like a culprit, trembling, and with my tongue dry against the roof of my mouth. "Jack," she said, "I have watched you through this window since we sailed, watched you in your strength and mastery of your calling. And I have listened to your voice, that roused me from sleep on the first night, and which I recognized as yours. And I said to myself that you were a man, that you must be a man, and that I may have misjudged you. But here, you assault an invalid for a quarrel over five years old, that began in my behalf, I admit, but which ended in your own." "An invalid," I managed to say. "A quarrel--in my behalf? Go on, please, Miss Morton." "In your own," she repeated. "Of course, I do not know how men feel, and what the best may say at times about--about a woman. But could you not let it drop, instead of resuming it here, on this ship, where I am a passenger?" "Please explain. You let _me_ drop, Miss Morton, when I needed you; but I have not complained. It seems that the slightest inquiry must have apprised you of my extremity. It seems that something might have been done that would not compromise you." It was her turn to be mystified. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Do you deny me dignity, self-respect, pride, or confidence in myself? Could I _inquire_ about a man who had taken advantage of my momentary weakness and boasted of it? Not only boasted, but threatened to a member of my family that he would follow up his advantage for revenge at a beating?"