That afternoon the sea roused herself drowsily, turned over, and yawned. The blue waves of the morning were gone. In their place were huge, oily, black swells, which lazily lifted the Columbia, held her suspended for a long minute, and then with slow, shuddering reluctance let her down, down, down. An interesting young Scotchman who was sitting by Jessica's side on deck stopped suddenly in the midst of an impassioned tribute to the character of Robert Brace, looked in her face for an instant with eyes full of a horrible fear, and hastily joined a stout German in a spirited foot-race to the nearest companionway. A High-church English divine, who had met me half an hour before and had hastened to spare me future heartaches by explaining at once that he was married, rose abruptly from his chair beside me and wobbled uncertainly to the deck-rail, where he hung suspended in an attitude of pathetic resignation. Thus recalled to the grim realities of life, Jessica and I looked up and down the deck. It was deserted—deserted save for a little black figure that trotted rapidly past us, clutching occasionally at the empty air for support as she was hurled from one side to the other of the glistening deck, but cheerful, undaunted, and happy.
"I got to have some exercise," panted Aunt Nancy, as she reclined for an instant in my lap, where a lurch of the ship had deposited her; "so I'm takin' a little walk." She was still walking when Jessica and I retreated hurriedly to our cabin.
The days that followed are too sad to be described by the most sympathetic pen. The sea, moved to her uttermost depths as she had not been in twenty-five years, resented fiercely the presence of the Columbia on her disturbed bosom. Madly she cast her from her; with feline treachery she drew her back again, and sought to tear apart her mighty timbers. Groaningly, agonizingly, pluckily, the Columbia bore all—and revenged herself on her passengers. She stood on her head, and sent them, so to speak, into her prow. She rose up on her stern, and scattered them aft. She stood still and shuddered. She lay down on her left side until she had imperilled the heart action of every person on board; she rolled over on her right side and started briskly toward the bottom of the sea. She recovered herself, leaped up and down a few times to prove that she was still intact, and did it all over again. Meanwhile the passengers, locked below and sternly commanded to keep to their cabins, held fast to the sides of their berths and prayed fervently for death.
Neither Jessica nor I was actively ill, but Jessica's indifference to food and social intercourse was marked in the extreme. Stretched on her back in the berth opposite my own, she lay day and night with closed eyes and forbidding demeanor, rousing herself only long enough to repel fiercely any suggestion that she take nourishment. Also, she furnished me with one life-long memory. From sheer ennui I ordered and devoured at noon on the third day a large portion of steamed peach dumpling, with hard sauce. The look which Jessica cast first upon this dish and then upon me will always, I think, remain the dominant feature of my most troubled dreams.
During this time I had not forgotten Aunt Nancy, though I am sure Jessica had. Her cabin, however, while on the same deck as our own, was at the other end of the ship, and I had grave doubts of my ability to cover safely the distance between. Finally I attempted it, and, aside from the slight incidents of blacking one eye in an unexpected diversion to the rail, and subsequently being hurled violently against the back of an axe nailed to the wall, I made the passage in safety. Aunt Nancy was not in her cabin, but a hollow groan from the upper berth betrayed the fact that her room-mate was. From this lady I was unfortunately unable to extract any information. She seemed to feel that I was mercifully sent to chloroform her out of existence, and her disappointment over my failure to play this Samaritan role was so bitter that I was forced to withdraw lest she should utter things unbefitting a gentlewoman.
Down the long corridor, as I groped my way back, something blew toward me like a wraith from the sea. It wore a gray, woolly bathrobe, a tiny wisp of white hair fastened precariously with one hair-pin, and a pair of knitted bedroom slippers. It was Aunt Nancy, and we executed then and there an intricate pas de deux in our common efforts to meet. Finally the Columbia ceased her individual evolutions long enough to enable us to grasp the passage-rail.
"I've been in your cabin," I explained, above the roar of wave and wind, as we stood facing each other. "I was afraid you were ill."
Aunt Nancy looked almost pained at such a suspicion.
"My, no," she disavowed, hastily; "but there's them that is," she conceded. "I've been to see—let me see—thirty of 'em to-day—men an' women both. Poor Mr. Jackson's about the worst. I never SEE such a sick man. I got this cracked ice for him," she added, looking down at the glass she was clasping to her bosom with her free hand. "I'd 'a' looked in on you," she added, kindly, "if I hadn't been so busy, but I heard you wa'n't neither of you sick."
I explained with some effort that I felt comfortable as long as I lay still, but that as soon as I was on my feet, the motion—We parted hurriedly.