Whilst he was going up-stairs a man dressed in blue serge, smoking a curly meerschaum pipe, came out of a bedroom and passed into an apartment that had been converted into a sitting-room. They glanced at each other, and Hardy went up another flight to his bedroom. Here he stayed a few minutes. His carpet-bag had arrived before him, and in it were a change of apparel, two or three shirts, brush and comb, and the like. The rest of his duds were in his sea-chest, which had been sent to the docks. He smartened himself up and looked a manly young fellow. The light of the sea was in his eye, and the freshness of its breath was in his cheery expression, and the colour of his cheek was warm with the sun-glow. "Are you ready?" said he to Julia; and they went out, attended to the door by the widow, who appeared to have taken a liking to Miss Armstrong; but no one with a woman's heart in her could have heard the girl's story without being moved. Hardy paused on the doorstep to say to Mrs. Brierley, "Is the man in blue serge, who smokes a meerschaum, the captain who's lodging with you?" "Yes, sir." "What ship does he command?" "The _Glamis Castle_." "I know her," exclaimed Hardy; "a fine Indiaman. What the deuce does a swell like him do in these lodgings? He should put up at a hotel." "His home's at Penge," answered the widow, "and two or three weeks before he sails he always comes and stops with me, and brings his wife. Aren't my lodgings good enough for the captain of an Indiaman?" "They are good enough for the owner of an Indiaman. They are good enough for a German prince," said Hardy, in his pleasantest manner. "Should I bring this lady here if they were not of the highest?" And nodding to her he stepped on to the pavement, and Julia walked by his side. He was free in his comments upon the nastiness of the East End of London, and by his abuse of the mud and the shops, and the quality of the passing folks, he implied an apology for introducing Miss Armstrong into such a neighbourhood. "It's sweeter to me than Bodley," she said, referring to the place she came from. "What is the good of fine houses and broad streets and handsome carriages to a girl who has no money, who has but one friend, from whom she must be shortly separated for ever, perhaps, and whose most ambitious dream _dare_ not go beyond finding a cabin as emigrant or stewardess aboard a ship, and the berth of a servant, or, which is worse, a nursery governess when she arrives?"