The wind was roaring about them. The sea was black and the sky was black, a thick velvety black that turned to copper when the lightning came.

"Aren't you afraid?" Marie-Louise demanded; "aren't you?"

"No."

"Why shouldn't you be? Why shouldn't anybody be?"

"My nerves are strong, Marie-Louise."

"It isn't nerves. It's faith. You believe that the boat won't go down, and you believe that if it did go down your soul wouldn't die."

Her white face was close to him. "I wish I could believe like that," she said in a high, sharp voice. Then she screamed as the little ship seemed caught up into the air and flung down again.

"Hush," Richard told her; "hush, Marie-Louise."

She was shaking and shivering. "I hate it," she sobbed.

Pip, like a yellow specter in oilskins, came up to them. "Eve wants you, Brooks," he shouted above the clamor of wind and wave.