When the train ran into Dover he got to his feet with a sigh of relief. Quickly as he was out of the train a great many passengers had left it before him. He started at a run down the platform. He stared at every woman he met, hoping it would be Esther. The crowd was getting thick; he had to push his way unceremoniously past people; porters with luggage trucks jostled him; he began to lose his temper--he was just answering with great heat a man who had cynically asked "who he was shoving," when some one touched his arm. "Micky...." For a moment Micky's heart beat up in his throat; he turned quickly and found himself looking down into the brown eyes of Marie Deland. If she had hoped for anything better, it must have been a shock to her to see the bitter disappointment in Micky's face. He stammered out that he had not expected to see her, that he was in a deuce of a hurry; he hoped she would forgive him, but-- "Micky, by all that's wonderful!" said another voice, and there was Marie's father, the good-natured old man who had pretended to agree with his wife when she raved against Micky for the cavalier way in which he had treated his daughter, but who in his heart had indulged in a quiet chuckle, thinking that Micky had been rather clever to escape from the toils at the eleventh hour. He shook hands with Micky heartily enough; he, at any rate, had no grudge against him. He asked Micky a hundred questions. "Are you going over, my boy? Come with us. I've got a reserved carriage on the Paris express. Delighted to see you. Marie and I are just off for a little holiday by ourselves." He touched his daughter's arm. "Ask him to join us, my dear." Micky did his best to answer civilly; he was in the deuce of a hurry, he said again; he had got to meet a friend but had missed her in the crowd. "I came off in the deuce of a hurry," he said. He was chafing bitterly at this enforced delay; each moment was so precious. Marie touched her father's arm. "We are only keeping Mr. Mellowes, Daddy...." Something in her voice made Micky's eyes smart. It was hard luck that for the second time he was forced to humiliate her. He stammered out incoherently that he hoped they would forgive him, but he was in such a deuce of a hurry.... He went off abruptly. Everybody was off the train now, and many people were already on the boat. Micky remembered that he had no ticket; he entered into a hot argument with an official, who listened to him skeptically, and took as long as possible to make out the ticket; even when Micky had paid he still looked suspicious. The gangway was still down; Micky went on board and stood as close to it as he could, scanning the face of each passer. Esther was not amongst them. "Stand away there--stand away...."