"None," he replied. "Marie has no wish to spoil her figure."
For some reason this seemed to dispel both Deborah's jealousy and guilt. She held him closer still and murmured, "Poor Darling Charles. No wonder ye dreamt of other women."
"No wonder ..." he replied, scarcely knowing what he said. For at that moment sleep crept over him irresistibly.
Once again he was in the extinct odd little train, emerging from the choking tunnel. Miraculously, rumpled nightgown and all, Deborah was with him. Her blue eyes were red with smoke and she was coughing and frightened. She managed to gasp, "What is it—what is this horrid thing?"
He held her close and said, "It's a part of my dream, darling."
Even as he spoke and wondered how and why his dream should be dominant it changed. The rectangular windows of the old wooden coach grew indistinct. The car roof seemed to grow dimmer, finally to vanish altogether.
Against the starlit black of space were outlined the spars and ropes and masts and sails of a full-rigged sailing ship. They stood on its gently rocking poop and forward and below Justin could make out the waist and, beyond, the rise of the forecastle and the sharp lift of the sprit from the bow.
He looked at Deborah, saw how the breeze caught her hair and whipped it like some magnificent pennant of brownish gold and saw that she was speaking to him, crying, "This is my dream, Darling Charles—and I like it far better than thine."
"So do I," he replied, over-whelmed utterly by the miracle.
They floated slowly down until the sky once more was blue above them, first a dark unlikely blue, then lighter and increasingly familiar in hue. Once more Justin saw the earth flatten out and the first white woolly clouds appear.