She told him. He frowned with the puzzle of his mind.
"You can judge now for yourself," said he. "Is it right that a man like this should command a ship whose safety became doubly precious to me this morning?"
She smiled gently, but gravity quickly returned; she could not but reflect his face of worry and uncertainty. The great dog was lying at his master's door, and all was silent in the captain's cabin. This, in the pause, made her say:
"He may commit suicide."
"Not whilst he believes his son is alive and to be found," answered Hardy.
He walked to the door of her berth, opened it, and she saw that it was as comfortably equipped as the ship would allow.
"You shall have a hair-brush and whatever else I possess to give you," said he. "But how about clothes? I can't dress you."
"I am saved," she answered, "and that is enough to think of at present."
This was a spirited answer for a girl who was talking to the man she loved, for would not any girl, addressing the man of her heart, grow pensive to the thought that she had but one gown to wear in the whole world?
He felt a certain sense of independency owing to the captain's state, and considered that he was entitled to act beyond his rights as a mate. By which I mean that it could not much concern him if the captain came out and found him talking to the girl, and generally acting as though he were a passenger instead of an officer of the ship.