He would have brought his sister Mary along perhaps, or maybe John Peters, or that silly Fannie Heathrow. They would have stood down there on the dock and yelled things she couldn’t hear, and laughed and carried on the way that crowd down there near the man with the child were doing, and she would have been mortified to death and been only too glad to sail away into oblivion out of their reach. Oh, she ought to be glad there were no people like that down on the wharf to see her off!

So she tried to smile, and most unexpectedly there came great, fat, hot tears plunging down her cheeks and splashing on her hand on the railing. Someone who was passing, a young man in well-cut tweeds, paused and looked down at her.

She decided not to look up till he had gone on, because she was just sure another tear was on its way down and would be sure to fall right before him. She mustn’t be seen crying, even by a stranger.

So with eyes downcast, she stood there and sighted the neat creases in the tweed trouser legs there just at one side.

But he wasn’t moving on. Was he just going to stand there? She lifted an investigating glance and met a puzzled gaze looking down at her. And then a friendly voice asked in an astonished tone:

“Why, isn’t this Rose Galbraith? It surely is! What are you doing here? Not leaving the country, are you?”

Then she looked up with a radiant face. “Oh,” she said with a great relief in her glance, “why, it’s Gordon McCarroll! I’m so glad you spoke to me! I was just feeling awfully forlorn because everybody else seemed to have someone around who knew them, and I didn’t have anyone to even say good-bye to.”

Rose looked up with her lashes all dewy and gave a shamed shy little smile, like a child that was embarrassed.

The young man looked down at her with a kind smile.

“Say, now, that’s tough. I certainly am glad I happened along! The company sent me here with some papers for an Englishman who is sailing on this boat, and I didn’t dream I’d see anybody I knew. Say, are you going over for the summer? Just a trip? My! I wish I were going! I love the water, and maybe we could get really acquainted. But I’ve got a regular job now and haven’t any time for playing around in Europe. I suppose you’ll have a great time. Where did you say you were going?”

“I’m going to Scotland,” said Rose soberly, almost sadly.

“But say! Aren’t you thrilled? I’ve never been to Scotland, and I’ve always been crazy to go, ever since I read those books we had in lit class. I liked them so much I read a lot of others too. I want to see Loch Lomond and Loch Katrine, and all the others. But you don’t seem very happy about it. Aren’t you anticipating a good time?”

Rose dropped her gaze for an instant and drew a deep trembling sigh, with just a faint glimmer of a smile on her lips as she looked up.

“I’m not feeling very happy about it just now,” she said, drawing a deep quick breath to keep the tears back, “because you see, Mother and I were going together. It is Mother’s native land, and she was so happy to be taking me back there to show me everything. But just last week she went home to heaven to live.”

“Oh!” said the young man with a great gentleness in his voice. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. And now it is going to be very hard for you.”

Rose struggled to answer, but instead two great tears swelled out and rolled down her cheeks, and she could only lift her tear-drenched eyes to his face for an instant’s apology and then look down again. Suddenly the young man reached out both his hands and took her small trembling hands in his.

“I am so very, very sorry,” he said tenderly, and as she lifted her eyes again she met a deeply sympathetic glance. “I know how hard it must be for you,” he said, “I have a very dear mother myself.”

She flashed a look that was half a smile, yet full of sudden sorrow.

“I thought you would have a mother like that,” she said shyly.

There was an answering glow in his eyes and his fingers pressed hers again as they still held them lightly.

“Thank you,” he said appreciatively. Then after an instant of quiet he asked, “And now, who are you with?”

“Just myself,” she said with a sad little smile.

“Oh, that’s too bad,” he said sympathetically. “I wish there were somebody on board I knew to whom I could introduce you. But you’ll get acquainted.”

“Perhaps,” she said wistfully. “But I guess I don’t get to know people easily. That was why I was glad to have you speak to me. It seemed so strange and lonely here.”

“I’m glad I was here!” he said with a sunny smile, and then his handclasp gave a quick close pressure, and it was not till then that either of them realized that he was still holding her hands.