Of course, I endeavored to look smiling and cheerful, a hard task indeed when the little vessel seemed twisting and creaking under our very feet as though she might be torn asunder by the violence of the waves.
Perhaps I overshot the mark; I imagine my smile must have been close on the borders of a graveyard one.
At any rate, it did not calm Diana, who clung to my arm, beseeching me wildly to tell her the truth—declaring that she was not ready to die, and begging me to save her.
Gustavus conquered his own fear, and became a man—he threw his arms around his wife and tried to calm her frenzy.
I knew it would wear out by degrees, to be succeeded perhaps by that stony despair even more terrible to behold where the horrified soul, hovering on eternity, looks out from burning eyes, and cries for the succor no man may give.
I turned away, sick at heart.
Was this, then, the end?—were we all doomed to meet our fate there amid the wild surges; or would Heaven be merciful and spare us?
Then I remembered Hildegarde, and with my heart in my throat, so to speak, I walked over to the door of her stateroom and pounded upon it.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE HOUR OF PERIL.