
"Good-afternoon," she said cheerfully.

Mrs. Gething showed him to the door.

"Any time you are at Gravesend, captain, we shall be pleased to see you
and hear how you get on," she said as she let him out.

The captain thanked her, pausing at the gate to glance covertly at the
window; but the girl was bending over her work again, and he walked away
rapidly.

Until he had reached his ship and was sitting down to his belated dinner
he had almost forgotten, in the joyful excitement of having something to
do for Miss Gething, the fact that she was engaged to another man. As he
remembered this he pushed his plate from him, and, leaning his head on
his hand, gave way to a fit of deep melancholy. He took the photograph
from his pocket, and, gazing at it intently, tried to discover a
likeness between the father and daughter. There was not sufficient to
warrant him in bestowing a chaste salute upon it.

"What do you think o' that?" he inquired, handing it over to the mate,
who had been watching him curiously.

"Any friend o' yours?" inquired the mate, cautiously.

"No," said the other.

"Well, I don't think much of him," said the mate. "Where d'you get it?"

"It was given to me," said the skipper. "He's missing, and I've got to
find him if I can. You might as well keep your eyes open too."

"Where are you going to look for him?" asked the mate.

"Everywhere," said the other. "I'm told that he's likely to be in a
seaport town, and if you'll be on the look-out I'll take it as a favor."

"I'll do that, o' course," said the mate. "What's he been doing?"

"Nothing that I know of," said the skipper; "but he's been missing some
five years, and I promised I'd do my best to find him."

"Friends are anxious, I s'pose?" said the mate.

"Yes," said the other.

"I always find," continued the mate, "that women are more anxious in
these sort o' cases than men."

"More tender-hearted," said the skipper.

"It ain't a bad sort o' face, now I come to look at it," said the
baffled mate, regarding it closely. "Seems to me I've seen somebody v