THE CARGO SHIP 17

wife said, Yes, she wouldn't mind coming to Africa,
and after dinner she changed her mind too. He was
a bad artist, but he wasn't a bogus one. He lived on
almost nothing; he believed in himself and in his
hazy Teutonic ideas; and there was a sensual beauty
in their relationship. The two lived in a kind of
continuous intimacy, she had no ideas but his, no
vitality but his; he supplied all the life for both of
them and she supplied a warm friendly sensual death;
they shared the universe between them All the time,
in the cabin, at dinner, at a cafe table, they gave the
impression of having only just risen from bed.

By dinner-time everyone was drunk on bad
Madeira and the pink gin they called Coasters. The
shipping agent sang The Old Homeland and The
Floral Dance and I shot an Arrow into the Air and
the fat traveller called Younger said, "Pass me some
more eau de cow/' spilling his coffee. The aliens went
to their cabin, picking their way across the lower
deck and up the iron stairs into the stern; she was
seasick, but it only made her quieter; it didn't alter
her beautiful sensuous receptivity. The agent sang
The Old Homeland again—"Far across the sea, I
wonder will they pray for me"—and everyone felt
English and exiled and wistful, everyone except
Younger, who climbed carefully up the stairs, cling-
ing to the banister: "I'm going home by rail." He
was more English than any of them; the north
country was in his heart; he was firmly local and un-
sentimental and bawdy and honest. He drank
because he needed a holiday, because he had heavy
work before him on the Coast, because he loved his
wife and had desperate anxieties. He had more cause