Another and a wilder rush of wind; a black cloud just overhead sent down a dash of wind, which ceased as suddenly as it began.
It seemed to Lawrence that he had great presence of mind because he continued to keep control of the rudder. He tried to think as well as to feel, but his quick-coursing blood prevented thought.
How could he ever have believed for one moment that he loved Carolyn? Why, his whole heart belonged to this woman who was clinging to him as if it would be death to her to be put away.
He wished to speak, to say something that he ought to say, but his voice stopped in his throat.
The Vireo flashed by a dark body that had a light shining at its bows,—some ship swinging at anchor. Vaguely Lawrence heard a man on the deck above him shout out something, he could not distinguish what.
He and Prudence were flying through space—together. Then, still vaguely, and with a threatening horror, he thought of that picture of Francesca and her lover flying always through trackless air, never stopping, gulfs below them, infinitude above them. They had supped full of love, and now—
"Dearest!"
It was the voice of Prudence saying that word again. Lawrence wished to rouse himself to some sense of duty; but duty appeared to be something indefinite and very far away; and then perhaps he had been cherishing some old-fashioned, mistaken sense of what was duty. If that was so—
"Are you going to turn towards the shore?"
Prudence asked the question as if she were speaking of a thing impossible to do. She was looking at him with eyes whose beauty and deep, seductive power he could perceive through the dusk.