Sue—[Passionately.] I don’t care—I don’t want to know anything about it. What I do know is that you can’t sail now. Oh, Pa, don’t you see you can’t? Haven’t you any heart at all? Can’t you see how bad Ma is?
Bartlett—It’s the sight o’ me sickens her. She’ll git better with me away from her.
Sue—No. She needs you. She doesn’t want you to go. She called your name just a while ago—the only word she’s spoken since she christened the ship. Come in to her, Pa! Tell her you won’t go!
Bartlett—[Desperately.] I got to git away from her, I tell ye, Sue! She’s been houndin’ me ever since I got back—houndin’ me with her stubborn tongue till she’s druv me mad, a’most! Ye’ve been on’y givin’ thought to her, not me. They’s my side to it, too!
Sue—I’ll talk to her, Pa. She can’t realize she’s hurting you or she wouldn’t—And then everything will be just the same as it used to be again.
Bartlett—[Shaking his head.] They be too much between. The only chance for that be my plan—to sail away and come back with—what I be seekin’. Then she’ll give over her stubborn naggin’—if she’s human woman. It’s for her sake as much as my own I’m goin’—for her and you and Nat. [With a sudden return of his old resolution.] I’ve made up my mind, I tell ye, and in the end ye’ll know I be right. [A hail in Horne’s voice comes thinly up from the shore below. Bartlett starts, his eyes gleaming.] Ye hear? It’s Horne hailin’ me to come. They be ready to cast off. I’ll git aboard. [He starts for the ladder.]
Sue—Pa! After all I’ve said—without one word of good-bye to Ma! [Hysterically.] Oh, what can I do, what can I say to stop you! She hasn’t spoken but that one call for you. She hardly seems to breathe. If it weren’t for her eyes I’d believe she was dead—but her eyes look for you. She’ll die if you go, Pa!
Bartlett—No!
Sue—You might just as well kill her now in cold blood as murder her that way!
Bartlett—[Shaken—raising his hands as if to put them over his ears to shut out her words—hoarsely.] No! Ye lie! She’ll live till I git back and all’ll be as it was again!