“Get out!” said Jonsen, in a low, brutal voice. Without a word or sign Margaret gathered up her sewing and climbed on deck.

Jonsen smeared some Stockholm tar on a rag, and bound up Emily’s leg with more than a little skill, though the tar of course was agonising to her. She had cried herself right out by the time he laid her in his bunk. When she opened her streaming eyes and saw him bending over her, nothing in his clumsy face but concern and an almost overpowering pity, she was so full of joy at being at last forgiven that she reached up her arms and kissed him. He sat down on the locker, rocking himself backwards and forwards gently. Emily dozed for a few minutes: when she woke up he was still there.

“Tell me about when you were little,” she said.

Jonsen sat on, silent, trying to project his unwieldy mind back into the past.

“When I was a boy,” he said at last, “it wasn’t thought lucky to grease your own sea-boots. My Auntie used to grease mine before we went out with the lugger.”