When the women had returned to the drawing-room and Klondyke and Edward Ambrose and the Prince sat smoking their cigars, while Henry Harper was content with his usual cigarette, it suddenly grew clear to one of the four that these two sailormen very much desired to be left together. "Prince," said Edward Ambrose, "let us go and talk Shakespeare and the musical glasses." As soon as the door had closed Klondyke said: "Now, Sailor, you must have a little of this brandy. No refusal." He filled two liqueur glasses with the fastidious care of one who knew the value of this magic potion. "Sailor"--Klondyke had raised his own glass and was looking at him as of old, with eyes that had traversed all the oceans of the world as well as all its continents---"I'm very glad to see you here." As soon as the glass touched the lips of Henry Harper, something within him seemed to beat thickly, and then an odd sort of phrase began to roll through his brain. Somehow it brought with it all the sights and the sounds and the odors of the _Margaret Carey_. It was a phrase he had once heard a Yank make use of in the forecastle of that hell-ship, and it was to the effect that Klondyke was a white man from way back. That was quite true. Klondyke was a white man from way back. Not that Sailor had ever doubted it for a moment. XV To the disappointment of the drawing-room, Klondyke and the sailorman sat a long time together. They had much to say to one another. It was Klondyke, however, who did most of the talking. He had not changed in the least, and he was still the hero of old, yet the Sailor felt very shy and embarrassed at first. But after a while, the magic of the old intercourse returned, and Henry Harper was able to unlock a little of his heart. "Life is queer," said Klondyke. "And the more you see of it, the queerer it seems. Take me. If I had been born you, I'd have been as happy as a dead bird swabbing the main deck and shinning up the futtock shrouds and hauling in the tops'ls. And if you had been born me, you'd have been as happy as a dead bird going great guns and doing all sorts of honor to the family. I wanted to go into the Navy, but my mother and the old governor wouldn't stand for it. It must be diplomacy, because the governor had influence, and I was the eldest son and I ought to make use of it. What a job you would have made of that billet! And how you hated the _Margaret Carey_. It was hell all the time, wasn't it?" "Yes," said the Sailor, "just hell." "Still, it helped you to find yourself." "Yes--if I was worth finding." "Of course you were." "Anyhow, I took the advice you gave me," said the Sailor, with his odd simplicity. "You'd have given it yourself in the end without any help of mine. But it's strange that when I read your book I never guessed that you were the author, and that you were writing about our old coffin ship and the Old Man and the mate ... what was his name?" "Mr. Thompson."