Mr. Raleigh still sat in the position in which she had left him, when, a half-hour afterward, she returned.
"Where is your cloak?" he asked, rising to receive her.
"I spread it over Ursule, she was so chilly."
"You will not take cold?"
"I? I am on fire myself."
"Ah, I see; you have the Saturnalian spirit in you."
"It is like the Revolution, the French, is it not?--drifting on before the wind of Fate, this ship full of fire and all red-hot raging turbulence. Just look up the long sparkling length of these white, full shrouds, swelling and curving like proud swans, in the gale,--and then imagine the devouring monster below in his den!"
"Don't imagine it. Be quiet and sit beside me. Half the night is gone."
"I remember reading of some pirates once, who, driving forward to destruction on fearful breakers, drank and sang and died madly. I wish the whole ship's company would burst out in one mighty chorus now, or that we might rush together with tumultuous impulse and dance,--dance wildly into death and daylight."
"We have nothing to do with death," said Mr. Raleigh. "Our foe is simply time. You dance, then?"