“Bring up the spirit of Wylie, my woman,” he said, with a loud, uneasy laugh that suddenly died into profound silence.
She shook her head; raised her forefinger slowly, pointing into the shadow behind him.
“What do you see?”
“I see a ship—three-masted—a bark.” (Warrick started, nodding his head with a muttered oath.) “The sea is frozen; the ship is wedged between masses of ice; the sky is like a bronze plane above; there is neither sun nor wind.”
“On a whaler!” burst in Warrick. “I always knew it! I was in just such a scrape, off—Go on, go on.”
“There are two men on deck. One is heavily built, gray-headed; the other is spare, short, with red hair. There is a blood-mark on his chin.”
“Wylie! Alive!”
“Alive. His clothes are gray—”
“He wore gray the day he left,” said Warrick. “But, come to think of it now, he wouldn’t—”
“I was wrong. He wears a sailor’s dress.”