Monsieur quickly perceived that so long as this voluble little old lady—­who was as yellow as a frog, and had beady black eyes, but whose manner was exceedingly charming—­chose to attach herself to him, his pursuit of knowledge was not likely to be attended with much success, so he shut the book on his finger, and pleasantly said to her,

“Oh no, madame; I am only waiting here for some friends.”

Madame was greatly alarmed:  surely they would not cross in such frightful weather?  Monsieur ventured to think it was not so very bad.  Then the little French lady glanced out at the window, and threw up her hands, and said with a shudder,

“Frightful!  Truly frightful.  What should I do with those two little ones ill, and myself ill?  The sea might sweep them away!”

Mr. Brand, having observed something of the manners of Josephine and Veronique, was inwardly of opinion that the sea might be worse employed:  but what he said was—­

“You could take a deck-cabin, madame.”

Madame again shuddered.

“Your friends are English, no doubt, monsieur; the English are not so much afraid of storms.”

“No, madame, they are not English; but I do not think they would let such a day as this, for example, hinder them.  They are not likely, however, to be on their way back for a day or two.  To-morrow I may run over to Calais, just on the chance of crossing with them again.”

Here was a mad Englishman, to be sure!  When people, driven by dire necessity, had their heart in their mouth at the very notion of encountering that rough sea, here was a person who thought of crossing and returning for no reason on earth—­a trifling compliment to his friends—­a pleasure excursion—­a break in the monotony of the day!

“And I shall be pleased to look after the little ones, madame,” said he, politely, “if you are going over.”

Madame thanked him very profusely; but assured him that so long as the weather looked so stormy she could not think of intrusting Josephine and Veronique to the mercy of the waves.

Now, if George Brand had little hope of meeting his friends that day, he acted pretty much as if he were expecting some one.  First of all, he had secured a saloon-carriage in the afternoon mail-train to London—­an unnecessary luxury for a bachelor well accustomed to the hardships of travel.  Then he had managed to procure a handsome bouquet of freshly-cut flowers.  Finally, there was some mysterious arrangement by which fruit, cakes, tea, and wine were to be ready at a moment’s notice in the event of that saloon-carriage being required.

Then, as soon as the rumor went through the hotel that the vessel was in sight, away he went down the pier, with his coat-collar tightly buttoned, and his hat jammed down.  What a toy-looking thing the steamer was, away out there in the mists or the rain, with the brown line of smoke stretching back to the horizon!  She was tossing and rolling a good deal among the brown waves:  he almost hoped his friends were not on board.  And he wished that all the more when he at length saw the people clamber up the gangway—­a miserable procession of half-drowned folk, some of them scarcely able to walk.  No; his friends were not there.  He returned to the hotel, and to his books.