Then he set to work to make his moaning wife as comfortable as the terrible circumstances of their plight would permit. He took off his coat and got her into it, binding her cork jacket around. A rope was trailing from the stern and he secured this and tied it round her waist, giving one end to Fraser to hold and keeping tight hold of the other himself.
Very little was said as the endless hours of the night dragged their leaden length to a sullen dawn.
"Give me the morphia!" Olive had moaned at intervals, in a delirium of fever.
The seaman, who had been the man on watch when the "Starlight" struck the unlighted derelict, had cursed intermittently at the cause of the disaster. "Why didn't they show a blasted light?" he kept on repeating with obstinate illogicality. "Why didn't the fools show a blasted light?"
"Old man Larssen will give you hell when we get to shore."
Olive, in her delirium, caught at the words. "I can see the shore!" she cried. "Over there—over there! Why don't you row? You want to kill me first!"
Matheson tried to soothe her.
"We'll soon be on shore. A boat will pick us up at daybreak."
"Why didn't they show a blasted light?" cursed the seaman.
The sullen dawn uncurtained a waste of slag-coloured, heaving waters. The gale had spent its sudden fury, as though its work were now accomplished, but the sky was grey and inhospitable. Matheson raised himself on his knees on the keel of the boat again and again to search around, but no sail or steamer-smoke gave hope of rescue.