He patted her benevolently upon the shoulder and started forward. “Well, here goes the weary sea-boy to his slumbers.”
She waved her hand as he descended the forecastle ladder.
In a little while he slid back the overhead hatch a foot or so and looked out. He was invisible to the fair helmswoman, but the coils of her hair shone just above the top of the cabin roof.
“I’m almost asleep,” he called. “Good-night, Betty dear.”
He held his breath. Would the intimacy wrought of the night’s peril and companionship avail? An answer, low and very gentle, went with him to his dreams.
“Good-night, Bob White—dear.”
X
When he awoke, it seemed to him that he had slept a scant half-hour, but his watch, which had come unscathed through the wettings of the night, showed that mid-afternoon had come.
The Wisp rose and fell very gently, and he thought with satisfaction that the sea must be entirely calm.
In the tiny bath-room of the forecastle, he revelled in a fresh-water bath. As he passed the looking-glass, he surveyed his face ruefully. In vain to lament his looming beard! A diligent search failed to reveal the razor he had hoped Danton’s boatman might have left.