Serried phalanxes of deck-chairs already crowded the deck and filled every desirable position; but all were either occupied by happy voyagers, comfortably tucked up in rugs and motor veils and caps, or by wraps and luggage, chiefly masculine. Vainly did the hapless Ermengarde implore the boys and men constantly emerging from the bowels of the vessel, laden with chairs and stools, to fetch one for her. Stony silence, or at best a negative headshake, was all this lone, lorn female could extract from these iron-hearted creatures. She was still very weak; she was also famished; her little strength was exhausted by the preliminary journey; in dread of sea-sickness, she dared not turn her back to the vessel's direction, knowing she could neither walk up and down nor stand, as others did. She dared not descend the companion-ladder after the motion once began, and had she done so, knew herself to be incapable of carrying her rugs and small necessities. Shivering and faint, she was about to subside ignominiously on the planks, when she caught sight of a chair-carrier returning empty-handed to the companion, and once more entreated a chair of him. "Sorry, madam, nothing but camp-stools left," he said, and was despairingly told to bring anything that could be sat upon, which he quickly did--for a stipulated price. All this time an empty deck-chair had been on one side of her, and another, occupied by an exceedingly well-tucked-up, fur-collared and fur-rugged youth of athletic build, on the other. An elderly man, standing talking to a grey-haired woman who lounged in another deck-chair, was the lawful tenant of the empty chair; and when the boy at last appeared with a rickety camp-stool, on to which Ermengarde was about to sink from exhaustion in the standing-place she had with difficulty kept all this time between the two men's chairs, the elderly man suddenly appeared to become aware of her difficulties, and turned to her with a gruff, "Better change your stool for my chair--don't suppose I shall want it--rather walk up and down," and turned sullenly away. Sinking gratefully upon the long chair, so restful in spite of its wooden hardness, with the sun shining and the sea sparkling to the even movement of the great turbine vessel as they caught the faint breeze of their motion, Ermengarde would now have been happy, but for the fear of that dread penalty the sea exacts from sensitive voyagers, and the impossibility in her giddiness and weakness of opening the straps that held her rugs and shawls. How exasperatingly, aggressively, comfortable people looked, chatting and laughing in their cosy furs; some even shielded themselves from the mild warmth of the wintry sun with parasols, though Ermengarde would have welcomed the glare of a furnace, as she shivered in the sharp sea air.