And the eyes of my dear, too, were soft and kind, so that my heart cried out for a token, but my debt to de Vilela stood between us, and I only touched the little hand.
She looked at me somewhat strangely, I fancied, as if the coldness of my manner made her marvel, and I think that there perhaps was a faint gleam of laughing malice in the face of Grace O’Malley, who stood by. But in the morning, there, at the window high up the tower, were to be seen both my mistresses, with their fingers to their lips kissing me good-bye, as the galley was pulled out from the harbour.
It was now October, a month of storms, and we had to encounter head winds, heavy seas, and much stress of weather, so that our progress southward was slow. Keeping close in shore, we took advantage of whatever protection the coast, or the islands along it, afforded us, having frequently to put in and stop in one or another of the bays of Connaught.
A full week was thus taken up before we had gotten through the South Sound between Inisheer and the mainland, and, with the exception of some fishing boats, we had had the sea to ourselves.
As we passed down the rocky, mountain-crowned coast, we were sorely buffeted and wrought upon by the winds and waves. By the time we were abreast of the Cliffs of Moher, so furious a tempest was raging that I feared never would we live through it.
The stoutness of the galley, however, and perhaps some skill of seamanship, brought us safely to the Head of Cregga, which we essayed to round, but experienced so great a travail in the doing of it, albeit we did it, that we were well-nigh exhausted with the labour. But, once round the Head, we found ourselves in a stretch of water which, by comparison with that we had gone over, was as a quiet pool, to wit, the Bay of Liscanor.
And here we remained for some hours, looking for such an abatement of the storm as would allow us to proceed; but in this our hope was not to be realised as soon as we had expected, for the night fell, and the fury of the tempest was not spent.
The first object that met our gaze when the light of morning had come was a ship, all her masts gone, and the waves sweeping over her, go driving to her doom on the rocks of Cregga. As now her bows, now her stern was lifted up, so that we got a full view of her hull, there was that about her that seemed to me not unfamiliar, but I could not say then what it was. Clutching the ropes and bolts on and about what remained of her bulwarks were a few men, clinging desperately in the face of death to their last hold on life.
There was no possibility of the ship being saved, and there was hardly a greater likelihood of saving the lives of any of these miserable sailors, but I resolved to make the attempt, at least.
Bringing up The Cross of Blood as near as I dared to the Head, and having made ready to lower her two small boats, I waited for the moment when the vessel would crash upon the rocks, and be crushed and broken upon them. As she neared the cliffs, the spume of the waves shooting high and white in the air, the foaming, roaring waters, dashed back by the rocks, caught and twisted her about, so that, as her side was turned to us, I saw her name in letters of white and gold.