Page:C Q, or, In the Wireless House (Train, 1912).djvu/120

 never know what attracts the men so,—or at any rate they would never admit that they knew it. She could afford to be magnanimous. Indeed she was fully aware that either of her critics, had she dropped a handkerchief or a book upon the deck, would have breathlessly scrambled around on their bony old knees to return it to her with gracious smiles.

“Fantine!” she murmured drowsily.

“Oui, madame!”

“Ring for the stewardess! And order breakfast—honey, I think, this morning.”

“Oui, madame.”

The maid laid down the ruffle upon which she was sewing and rang the bell. She was a swarthy, wiry creature,—crisp, capable and discreet. Some day she would return to Paris and marry again, and educate her child, which just now was in an institution where she had placed it before taking service. There are many of these "widow-maids" in New York and London. But nobody knew about the child and nobody cared, and nobody would have guessed that each night she prayed to the Virgin with passionate tenderness for its safe keeping and, with the tears in her black eyes,