He said sullenly he wouldn't do anything of the kind.
She lashed the wheel and came up to him.
"I mean it, Greg," she said.
"You are going to your death, Madge," he said.
"Get into your boat!" she repeated.
He rose, and slowly began to obey.
"You may kiss me good-by, Greg," she said.
She put up her face to his; their lips met. Then, with her arm around him, she half forced, half supported him to the port quarter, where his boat was slopping against the side. He wanted to resist; he wanted to cry out and tell her the truth, but a strange, leaden powerlessness benumbed him. He got into the dinghy, drew in the dripping painter she cast after him, and watched her ease the sheet and set the vessel scudding for the passage. With her black hair flying in the wind, her bare arms resting lightly on the wheel, her straight, girlish, supple figure bending with the heel of the deck, she never faltered nor looked back as the water whitened and boiled in the schooner's wake.
Gregory came to himself in his own cabin. Cracroft, the mate, was bending over him with a bottle of whisky. The Malita steward was chafing his naked feet. Overhead the rush and roar of the gale broke pitilessly on his ears.