“So well that I want more,” I answered.
“No,” said she; “come on deck.”
She put on her hat, I carried a chair, and we seated ourselves in the shade of the little awning under which we had often sat and gesticulated, and endeavored to look our meanings in Greaves’ time. But now she spoke English very well indeed, while I had enough Spanish to enable me to converse with her in that tongue, though I never could catch the sonorous note of it, nor give the true twist to some of the words.
We sat together. The brig was sailing placidly over a wide surface of blue sea; the horizon was a bright line of opal against the dim violet of the distant sky, and abreast of us to larboard was a full-rigged ship, her hull below the sea line, and her canvas showing like little puffs of steam. The Kanaka was at the wheel; he was cook indeed, but when he was done with the caboose I put him to the ship’s work. One of the sailors who had charge walked in the waist; the other three were variously engaged.
I found myself gazing very earnestly at the lady Aurora, and thinking of her and of nothing but her. I was still under the influence of the witchery of her recitation, and then again I thought I had never seen her look so handsome. Am I in love with you? I wondered. Thought is as swift as dreams, and you may dream in your sleep through a thousand years in the time of the fall of an ash from the grate to the hearth. “Am I in love with you?” I said to myself, earnestly regarding her, her eyes being then fixed upon the distant sail. “I have a very great mind to offer you marriage. What will you say if I propose to you? Will your eyes flash, and will you show your teeth, or will you put on one of your tender, brooding looks? I have often thought that you would make as fine, useful, accomplished a wife as any young fellow need wish to live gayly and comfortably with. You sing deliciously. I don’t doubt you dance perfectly well. You can be saucy and quarrelsome in such a manner as to lend a new flavor to sentiment. You have a stately, handsome person; you are extremely well-bred, I am sure. I must take my chance of your relatives. Some of them may be grandees—let that be hoped for the sake of my children, who, if they take after me, will wish to be respectably connected. I’ll offer you marriage,” I thought to myself.
“Our troubles are nearly at an end,” said I.
“It is time,” she answered, keeping her eyes fastened upon the distant ship.
“We have been very closely associated, señorita.”
She now regarded me, and for an instant there was a peculiar softness in her gaze; she then seemed to find an expression in my face that alarmed her; I saw the change; she grew nervous, and her effort to control herself confused her.
“Yes, we have been much together, Mr. Fielding. I shall always regard you as the savior of my life, and never shall I forget your gentle and courteous treatment of me.”