With that I descended to her cabin and brought up a mattress, pillow, and blankets, which I laid on the deck. The sea had gone down and the ship was steady so my lady could lie comfortably without being cast against anything, but for precaution’s sake I put the mattress against the foot of the trunk cabin in the angle formed by the companionway. Before Mistress Lucy went to sleep we had our evening prayers. I had lighted the binnacle lamp in order to see the compass course and she stood by it, reading a psalm from her prayer book, which she had carried ever with her, and so on until we said good-night. She lay down at once and closed her eyes and I thought she was asleep.
The steering of the ship was not very exhausting. Under the diminished sail, which was all that we could carry, she steered easily and the wheel did not make many demands upon me. I confess frankly that I never was so utterly weary in my life. I had not had a regular sleep for three days and I had worked to the extreme limit of my strength during all that time. I found myself nodding over the wheel and finally I must have gone sound asleep. The pressure of my body as I leaned on the spokes brought the ship around and it was the tremendous slatting of the sails in the wind, which was ever freshening, that awoke me.
The noise awoke my mistress too. She had learned the sailor’s trick of waking with all her faculties at her command, and this time she realized the situation and came to her senses quicker than I did.
“You were asleep,� she said, rising.
“Aye, that I was,� I answered shamefacedly, bringing the ship before the wind again.
“What time is it?� she asked.
When the sails began to draw once more, I pulled out my watch and soon discovered that it was only nine o’clock.
“I have had one hour’s sleep,� she said, “and am able to take the watch now. I should not have taken advantage of your offer before. You have done enough in the past three days to have killed half a dozen ordinary men. Now, do you go to sleep and I will watch.�
“You will wake me at midnight?� I asked.
She nodded. At this I put my watch into her hand and started to go below.