He apparently did not hear her.
“Captain Fordyce,” she cried, indignantly, “will you come back?”
Her voice impressed him this time, and he turned around. His determined young wife had fallen on her knees in the water; with one hand she held back a tangle of curls that the wind had blown about her face; with the other she groped after a slipper sailing merrily toward the lee scuppers. With a few quick strides he was beside her, and, lifting her up, attempted to put her in the doorway. But she wriggled away from him, and took hold of the iron railing that ran around the deck cabins.
“You must not stand here,” he said, shortly.
She gazed earnestly at his averted face. Her eyes were full of tears, her voice seemed to have left her. “It must be his strange appearance,” she reflected, mournfully. “Those bandages are dreadfully disfiguring. One of his eyes is quite closed; his face is swollen, and the corner of his mouth is half-way up his cheek: and perhaps it is my fault. ’Steban,” she said, tentatively, “I heard about your fall a few minutes ago. I am so sorry—Good gracious! what an immense wave! Do you think it is coming over?”
“Yes.”
She threw a hurried glance about her. The Merrimac was lurching heavily. Along her sides the waves seemed hollowed out in a huge valley; other waves rose behind them like a range of hills. A dizzy feeling came over her, and she felt as if she were slipping for ever into the yawning gulf before her. “’Steban, ’Steban!” she shrieked, imploringly, as she clung to him, “don’t let me fall.”
His arms were strong. One of them was around her, the other grasped a stanchion. She felt perfectly safe now, and her heart beat a little quicker. His face was still averted. Jealousy, the rage of man, had probably entire possession of him; but just for an instant when they went down, down, till the rail that surrounded the deck dipped into the sea, the grasp of his arm tightened, the expression of his face changed. But when the ship righted herself he was again cold and forbidding, and all her courage died away. Dropping her eyes, she said, meekly, “I will go in now.”
“Wait an instant,” he said, quietly. “You must give up talking to that young man who has been amusing you during the past two days, and who was having so touching an interview with you last evening.”
“He is a very nice young man,” said Nina, feebly.