That touch of humanism perfected it. The men gave him a cheer, shook the hands he held out to them, and went to work like heroes at the pumps.
For an hour Bess knelt in the cabin under the poop with Jeffray’s St. Thomas à Kempis in her hands. She was listening, listening through the rush of wind and waters, for any sound that might betray the purpose of the night. All the past happenings of the year seemed to flash before her eyes, even as memories flash through the brain of a drowning man. She held Jeffray’s book against her bosom, careless of how the water from the broken windows soaked her dress.
Bess was growing cold and hopeless as she knelt, when she heard a voice calling to her through the weakening wailing of the wind.
“Bess! Bess!”
She sprang up and unlocked the door, to find herself in Jeffray’s arms.
“We have won! We have won!”
He was drenched to the skin, but warm and aglow with working at the pumps.
“The old ship will float.”
“Thank God!”
“Come out with me and see the dawn.”