Larry O’Keefe
Pressing back the questions I longed to ask, I introduced myself. Oddly enough, I found that he knew me, or rather my work. He had bought, it appeared, my volume upon the peculiar vegetation whose habitat is disintegrating lava rock and volcanic ash, that I had entitled, somewhat loosely, I could now perceive, Flora of the Craters . For he explained naively that he had picked it up, thinking it an entirely different sort of a book, a novel in fact—something like Meredith’s Diana of the Crossways , which he liked greatly.
He had hardly finished this explanation when we touched the side of the Suwarna , and I was forced to curb my curiosity until we reached the deck.