Again and again I feared the vessel was moving, sliding off the reef into the vortex of waters; and it required a wonderful amount of self-control to prevent my tell-tale face from communicating these sudden shocks to the dear eyes that watched me so closely.
Presently Cummings came in.
The poor fellow had been hard hit—I could see that only his grit kept him up.
I at once brought him a bottle of liquor in the hope that it might at least prove a temporary stimulant and brace him up.
Between Cummings and myself there was a bond of unusual sympathy; he mourned a good wife, while I, too, had up to now been bereft; many times we had talked together, and he had in a measure been my confidant, the only soul to whom I had poured out the bitterness of a broken heart.
I saw him look curiously at Hildegarde, and while I waited on him, I managed to put my mouth to his ear and say:
“She is my wife, my Hildegarde—Heaven has seen fit to unite us, perhaps to let us atone for it all by dying together. It is well, my friend.”
Then he squeezed my hand in his warm clasp.
“I rejoice with you, Morgan—perhaps the same kind Heaven means that I shall no longer be separated from my angel Mary. I feel it somehow, that she is nearer to me this night than since the hour she died in these arms. It is as God wills—I am satisfied; without her, life is, at best, a weariness to the flesh.”
Here spoke a stoic and a philosopher.