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 to love a ship quite as though it were a person, yet also a home. Good old Clytemnestra! This great steamship was tearing him away from something he cherished more than he had known. He thought of a sentence he had read in a wise French book: "Life is a series of partial deaths." But, as he mourned the death of the precocious cabin-boy, he reflected that life was, by the same token, a series of creations. "Laval est mort," he philosophized. "Vive Minas!" The mantle of the cabin-boy, complete with honourable discharge, had descended upon Master Paul Minas, first-class passenger. Gentleman Jim, to be sure. Shorty's taunts were only the vesture of envy. Poor Shorty didn't suspect the self-belittling effect of envy, and would go on taunting people till he had shrunk into nothing. Above all else, Paul wished to avoid such a fate. Mark Laval had taught him a lifelong lesson by showing up his narrow-mindedness. He had a morbid fear of setting out on any path that seemed easy. He even distrusted the magical book of cheques which he was carrying under his belt. By merely signing his name twenty times he could have as much money as Mr. Silva had paid for his little house in Hale's Turning, and that didn't seem right. He was sure Mr. Silva's personal worth had something to do with the fact that Mr. Silva had had to toil for his possessions.

Despite these moralistic reflections, Paul could not be indifferent to the luck that was making it possible for him to see cities bigger than Halifax: Adelaide, named after a queen; Melbourne, where Melba was born; Sydney, whose harbour, according to Miss Hornby, was one of the most beautiful in the world, and, according to Miss Green, full of sharks which gobbled up boys and girls who fell off ferry-boats.

And at Sydney? Well, anything rather than go aboard the liner waiting to take him to Vancouver. He would have to write a letter to Dr. Wilcove, exonerating the