The Finn looked at her with a tragic sort of smile, pointed to the purse, then made a motion as of one drinking deeply. Hermione understood. "You are afraid that if I give you some change you may drink?" she asked. The Finn nodded vigorously, stood for a moment regarding her, then, with a tug at his forelock, turned on his heel and scuttled off down the slope toward the landing. CHAPTER III Close aboard the _Daffodil_, Wood was about to lift his voice in a hail when there came to his ears the sounds of one declaiming in a rich and resonant bass. Having observed the departure of the Finn some half-hour earlier, Wood decided that Mr. Applebo must be refreshing his solitude by the recital of some of his own verse. It was therefore with no more consciousness of eavesdropping than has one who pauses to listen to the practising of a musician that Wood rested on his oars, to be startled by the following interrogation:-- "_Tell me, beloved, since your eyes Hold all the azure of the skies, Why, then, when night their brightness mars, Those lustrous depths hold all the stars? But when the day's once more begun, I look, and lo ... there shines the sun, And when it sets, alack too soon, In each deep orb I find the moon._" "_The answer is, Hermione, All heaven's in those eyes for me._" Before Wood could sufficiently recover from the astonishment produced by this innocent query and its answer, the same voice continued in prose, apparently in criticism of the effort and as follows: "Shucks ... How do I know her eyes are azure? ... I never saw them.... They might be cadmium or cobalt or madder lake, for all me." (A pause, then) "when night their brightness mars ... mars ... oh, hell, what does it mar it with ... a handful of mud?" (Another pause, then) "Mars is rotten ... let's see ... mars, cars, spars, tars, chars, bars ... augh ... what the deuce ... oh, let it go; it's no worse than the rest. In each deep orb ... fudge, I wonder how many thousand millions of bum poets have said that ... oh, dammit ... dammit ... dammitttt..." There came the sound of paper violently torn. Wood, smothering his laughter at this unofficial peep into the soul of the poet, raised his voice:-- "Aboard the _Daffodil_..." There was no answer. Wood tried again. "Aboard the daffy daffodilly ... I say ... Harold..." Followed an instant of silence, then a tawny, leonine head was pushed up through the hatch. "Hello, Harold!" said Wood. The poet blinked a pair of clear, amber-coloured eyes. His mane of ruddy-yellow hair was touselled and his expression was that of a person surprised in a yawn. "Hello, Huntington!" he drawled, in a very deep and husky bass. The yellow eyes blinked once or twice at the dinghy. "You're off the _Shark_?" "Jusso, Mr. Pilot-fish. May I come aboard?"