officer went to a window for a conference with the official behind it, and returned to Sylvia to say that there was no room, not even a single berth vacant.  Some shabby woman-passengers with untidy hair and crumpled clothes drew near, looking at her with curiosity.  Sylvia appealed to them, crying out again, “My mother is very sick and I must go back to America at once.  Can’t any of you—­can’t you—?” she stopped, catching at the banisters.  Her knees were giving way under her.  A woman with a flabby pale face and disordered gray hair sprang towards her and took her in her arms with a divine charity.  “You can have half my bed!” she cried, drawing Sylvia’s head down on her shoulder.  “Poor girl!  Poor girl!  I lost my only son last year!”

Her accent, her look, the tones of her voice, some emanation of deep humanity from her whole person, reached Sylvia’s inner self, the first message that had penetrated to that core of her being since the deadly, echoing news of the telegram.  Upon her icy tension poured a flood of dissolving warmth.  Her hideous isolation was an illusion.  This plain old woman, whom she had never seen before, was her sister, her blood-kin,—­they were both human beings.  She gave a cry and flung her arms about the other’s neck, clinging to her like a person falling from a great height, the tears at last streaming down her face.

CHAPTER XLI

HOME AGAIN

The trip home passed like a long shuddering bad dream in which one waits eternally, bound hand and foot, for a blow which does not fall.  Somehow, before the first day was over, an unoccupied berth was found for Sylvia, in a tiny corner usually taken by one of the ship’s servants.  Sylvia accepted this dully.  She was but half alive, all her vital forces suspended until the journey should be over.  The throbbing of the engines came to seem like the beating of her own heart, and she lay tensely in her berth for hours at a time, feeling that it was partly her energy which was driving the ship through the waters.  She only thought of accomplishing the journey, covering the miles which lay before her.  From what lay at the end she shrank back, returning again to her hypnotic absorption in the throbbing of the engines.  The old woman who had offered to share her berth had disappeared at the first rough water and had been invisible all the trip.  Sylvia did not think of her again.  That was a recollection which with all its sacred significance was to come back later to Sylvia’s maturer mind.

The ship reached New York late in the afternoon, and docked that night.  Sylvia stood alone, in her soiled wrinkled suit, shapeless from constant wear, her empty hands clutching at the railing, and was the first passenger to dart down the second-class gang-plank.  She ran to see if there were letters or a telegram for her.

“Yes, there is a telegram for you,” said the steward, holding out a sealed envelope to her.  “It came on with the pilot and ought to have been given you before.”