Page:C Q, or, In the Wireless House (Train, 1912).djvu/127

 for exercise on the part of the ship ’s passengers. The shuffle-boarders were still at their eternal game, but most of the others had retired to the saloon or smoking-room for bridge, or were tucked up in their deck chairs, dreading over novels. Lily Trevelyan crossed the reserved second-cabin space, and, hesitating for a moment outside Cloud's door, climbed briskly up the ladder to Micky's office. The door was shut but, always ready for a joke, she opened it stealthily. Perhaps she put her hands over his eyes and make him guess who it was! He ’d guess, too!

But to her amazement Micky lay at his desk, his head on his arms, amid a riot of yellow sheets, sound asleep. He breathed heavily. He was, as she would have said, “dead to the world.” Poldhu or The Ushant might shriek across the ether waves, Tangier might summon impatiently, a sinking ship might send out the danger call of “S O S”&mdash;but it would be in vain. I would take more than a wireless message to wake Micky Fitz.

“Poor little man!” she whispered to herself. “Poor tired, little man!”

She leaned over and brushed his hair with