The thumping paddle-wheels, the phosphorescent waves, and the fey obscurity of the night wrought heavily upon Vango’s emotion, and the fumes of alcohol mingled in his brain. He was not happy; things went round a bit, and he had hard work controlling his thoughts. He longed for the gay cheerfulness of the saloon above, but he felt a need of the sharp night air to revive him, first. He watched the stairway suspiciously, feeling sure that the ghost of Mrs. Higgins, if she were to appear, would come that way. In point of fact, a woman did soon descend from the upper deck, and stood at the bottom of the stairs in some uncertainty, gazing about her. She was a heavy, middle-aged blonde, in a long black cape and veil, the type of a thousand weak, impressionable widows, and, in the dusk, through the glaze of Vango’s eyes, a passable counterfeit of the late lamented Mrs. Higgins. She soon perceived him, and came forward a few steps, while he retreated as far away, putting her off with futile gestures. Curious at this exhibition, the woman walked up to him with a question on her lips. She was, in all probability, in search of nothing more than a glass of water, but the medium had no more than time to hear, “Tell me where—” before he had mentally completed the inquiry for her. “Where—where is Lilian?” she meant, of course. Appalled, he had jumped over the chain in the stern, and as she approached with that demand piercing his conscience-stricken soul, he shrank back unconsciously. The first step carried him to the extreme end of the boat, the second led him, with a splashing fall, into the Bay. The waters closed over him, and the steamer swept on. When he came to the surface, spluttering but sober at last in the face of a new and more tangible danger, he heard the rising staccato of a woman’s shriek, and saw a pyramid of lights fading into the fog. Then he sank again, and all was cold, black, and wet. * * * * * He rose to the surface in a space clear of mist, dimly lighted by a wisp of moon. A few feet away a fruit-crate bobbed upon the waves in the steamer’s wake, and for this he swam. By placing it under his body, he found he could float well enough to keep his nose out of water, tolerably secure from drowning, for a time at least. The mist closed in upon him, was swept asunder, and shut down again. The current was bearing him toward the harbour entrance he decided, and, as he had fallen overboard about opposite Goat Island, he must by this time be in the fairway, drifting for the Golden Gate and the Pacific. He might, if his endurance held out, catch sight of some ship anchored in the stream, and hail her crew. But no lights appeared, and he grew deathly cold and stiff.