"So sorry to be late,but I couldn't really help it.I'll tell you presently,"she said,as they passed the turnstiles.
Jonah knew by her voice that she was in a bad temper,and his heart sank.
The afternoon that he had waited for and counted on for nearly a week would be spoiled.Never before in his life had his pleasures depended on the humour or caprice of anyone,but he had learned with dismal surprise that a word or a look from this woman could make or mar the day for him.He gave her a sidelong look,and saw she was angry by a certain hardness in her profile,and,as he stared moodily at the water,he wondered if all women were as mutable and capricious.In his dealings with women--shop-hands who moved at his bidding like machines--he had never suspected these gusts of emotion that ended as suddenly as they began.Ada had the nerves of a cow.
Over the way the Manly boat was filling slowly with mothers and children and stray couples.A lamentable band on the upper deck mixed popular airs with the rattle of winches.The Quay was alive with ferry-boats,blunt-nosed and squat like a flat-iron,churning the water with invisible screws.A string of lascars from the P.&O.boat caught his eye with a patch of colour,the white calico trousers,the gay embroidered vests,and the red or white turbans bringing a touch of the East to Sydney.
Suddenly the piles of the jetty slipped to the rear,and the boat moved out past the huge mail-steamers from London,Marseilles,Bremen,Hongkong,and Yokohama lying at the wharves.