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raced across the sky. Barry stood a little back from the railing in the shelter of a metal post, looking down on the hurly-burly of color and movement below. This was better than lying sleepless in his bunk, thinking his sad thoughts, listening to Scollins snore.
    There wasn't an inch of the small poop deck that didn't jump and dance. He saw Pegeen Flynn whirling around with a funny-looking fellow in an odd white jacket. No Jonnie Flynn to be seen. No Frank. They'd be exploring, looking for Barry maybe.
Ifs because of your grandfather and you, too. Bad cess to both of you. Can ya swim?
    A man in a navy blue coat, like a sailor's, almost, looked straight up at him and pointed, nudging the arm of a man beside him. Instinctively Barry pulled back, forgetting the metal pole with its studding of rivets; he whacked his head against it with a thump that jarred his teeth and made his eyes water.
Jakers!
What had he done to himself? And why? Those two fellows had meant him no harm. They were laughing, probably, at the way those jackass snobs of first class looked down on steerage. And weren't the first-class fellows a dull lot altogether, in spite of their riches?
    He pulled off one of his gloves, probing at his face, and felt the warm, wet trickle of blood. The gash was high on his left cheekbone and so sore he could hardly touch it. There'd be swelling, too. What a stupid ... And that was when he realized he'd dropped the glove. Where was it?
    The ship's lights shone white on the deck around his feet. There was no glove. Had it fallen? Had he somehow kicked it over the edge and into the ocean? Grandpop's glove. Or—He looked down again on the poop deck and saw it. It had fallen on a coiled rope and lay neady in the middle, like a cherry on top of a bun. Barry closed his eyes. His cheek was throbbing, but that wasn't the worst of it. The worst of it was the glove.
    Suppose he called down, pointed at someone to throw it up? They'd never. He knew it surely. They'd make sport with it the way the boys at school did when they took your cap or book and tossed it around from one to the other. There was no way they'd throw something back to a first-class passenger. One who'd come to gawk at them.
    What if he went down himself, then, and got it? Watley said first-class passengers sometimes did go into steerage. For a lark. He would never be noticed, not in that crowd. Not in that jumble of noise and movement. Carefully he checked again, sorting out the crowd below. Neither Jonnie nor Frank Flynn was there. They might come, though. He'd have to get down and back fast.
    Metal steps at the side led straight to the poop deck. The trick would be not being noticed on the staircase. He pulled his cap lower on his head and waited.
    In a few minutes the dancing stopped and someone called out, "Time for a song. Will you give us a song, Sean McGinnis?"
    A man in a long black coat said, "I will and all," and stood up on an overturned box and began to sing:
There is not in the wide world a, valley so sweet
    As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet.
    There was such stillness below now. Such attention. Everyone there was leaving a Vale of Avoca or someplace equally loved—or someone loved.
    Carefully, slowly, Barry undid a chain. First Class Only was printed on the other side of the sign that hung on it. He hooked the chain carefully back in place behind him and went silently down the steps.
    Bad luck take it! Two people were leaning now against the coil of rope, and from below here he could see that this wasn't going to be as easy a job as he'd thought. The rope coil was bigger, wider. Wouldn't it have to be, for a ship the size of the
Titanic
? There'd be no just reaching up and taking the glove. He'd have to climb—and not now. Not till the singing was over and the dancing started again. Not till those two people moved.
    He stood back against the railing, the ship's wake spreading like a white triangle in the ocean behind him, boiling itself