The tears suddenly gushed into her eyes, and she turned seawards to hide her face. I moved away, but before I had measured half-a-dozen paces, her hand was again upon my arm.
‘I am sorry,’ she said softly, hanging her stately head, ‘if I have said anything to vex you.’
‘I desire but one end,’ said I, ‘and that is your safety. To ensure it needs but a little exercise of tact on your part and a resolution to trust me.’
‘I do trust you,’ she exclaimed; ‘but am I wholly wanting in brains, that you will not suffer me to offer an opinion, nay, even to express a regret?’
‘You would be able to do nothing with this mad sailor,’ said I. ‘Rio is within a fortnight’s sail, and our safety depends upon our getting there.’
‘A fortnight!’ she cried—‘another fortnight of this horrible ship!’
‘Yes; but England is a long way off from where we are. Were you to get on board another vessel, you might be fully as uncomfortable as you are here, unless she should prove a passenger craft with ladies in her. A fortnight more or less could not signify. At Rio you will be able to purchase such articles as you immediately need, and there will be a choice of ships to carry us home in comfort.’
‘I believe you are right,’ said she, after a little pause, with something of timidity in the lift of her eyes to my face. ‘I was shocked and made irritable by alarm. I am sorry, Mr. Dugdale.’
The answer I was about to make was checked by Wilkins calling to us from the companion way that supper was ready.