Forever? No! Listen!
Listen to that rumble as the waves circle over the spot where the body has disappeared! It is the noise of the iron weights shifting from their places. They are tearing open the canvas in which the body is wrapped. They have rolled out of it and sunk into the sea.
And now look!
The body, free of the weights, has come up to the surface. It is floating like a boat. The torn canvas is opening out. It is spreading like a sail in the breeze. Away it goes over the sea! It is flying across the waters, straight for the land.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
The men stood and stared into each other's faces in speechless dismay. It was as though an avenging angel had torn the murdered man from their grasp and cried aloud in their ears, "Blood will have blood."
They strained their eyes to watch it until it became a speck in the twilight of the dawn, and could be seen no more.
Nor had the marvel ended yet. A great luminous line arose and stretched from their quarter toward the land, white as a moon's water-way, but with no moon to make it. Flashing along the sea's surface for several seconds, it seemed to the men like the finger of God marking the body's path on the waters.
The phenomenon will be understood by those only who have marked closely what has been said of the varying weather of this fearful night, and can interpret aright its many signs. To the crew of the "Ben-my-Chree" it had but one awful explanation.