“An evil dream, a nightmare. See; we are borne upon a fairy sea. All the world is at peace. This infinity of beauty is ours—it is for us alone.”
She shuddered a little and drew closer to him. “Oh, it is so vast, so inscrutable, this treacherous, pitiless water! Have we come nearer to the land?”
“Fifteen leagues at least. The wind has failed us but this half-hour. After you have eaten and drunk you shall sleep again, and when you awake I promise you land under the very lid of the eye.”
“And you—have you not slept?”
“Madame, I am a very owl of birds. But I have the hunger of a lynx.”
Then while she took the helm he set before her the food which Jacquard had provided. There were sea-biscuit, boucan, preserved fruits from the store of the San Isidro, and a pannikin of rum-and-water.
It was not until she ate that she discovered how hungry she was; Bras-de-Fer had eaten nothing for eight-and-forty hours. And so like two children they sat and supped hungrily. When the meal was done, Bras-de-Fer arranged the bread-bags and the pillow so that she might sleep in greater comfort, but she would not have it so.
“No, no,” she insisted, “I am well again and strong. If you do not sleep I shall not.” And so resolute was her tone that he forbore to press her further.
But sleep was the furthest from his own eyes. He felt not even the faintest touch of weariness. She leaned back upon his arm again, and so, hand in hand, they sat in their little vessel, mute and spellbound at the completeness of their happiness, which even the presence of grim danger was powerless to steal away from them. The air was sweet and balmy and brushed their cheeks like the breath from an angel’s wing. The first pungent aromatic odor of the land reached their nostrils, mingled delicately with the salt of the sea. In silence they watched the planets burn and glow red like molten iron against the star-bepowdered sky, across which the placid moon sailed down upon its promised course. Flying stars vied with each other in the brightness of their illuminations in their honor. And presently, shaming them into darkness, a giant meteor shot like a flaming brand across the spacious sky, spurning and burying in its splendid pathway a myriad of the lesser embers; which, when it was done, peeped forth again timidly upon the velvet night, ashamed of their small share in its glory. All of this they saw reflected doubly on an ocean of gray satin, which sent the bright reflections in wriggling rays like so many snakes of fire to mingle and play amid the glow of the caressing surges, which gushed languidly at their very feet.
To have spoken would have been to break the spell which bound them to the infinite. And so they sat enthroned in these wonderful dominions of which for the nonce they were prince and princess.