"I shall not forget," he answered, with a wave of his hand. "It is of thee that I think."
The adventurers were crowding around me with bulging eyes; evidently they were swelling with curiosity as to what this strange occurrence could mean, but they said naught to me. The boat had returned, and with a rush the vessel spread her sails and pursued her journey. I watched as long as I could see the solitary figure, standing by the giant oak, waving his sword at me. Finally I could no longer see the glimmer of the sun upon the steel; only a tiny black speck, and at last that too faded from my view—I had left him.
We passed the mouth of the river and struck the ocean. In front of us, a mile or two away, two vessels rocked and tossed upon the bosom of the Atlantic.
I heard White's voice by my side.
"It is the Dart and the Goodwill," he said, "our two consorts. We will soon overtake them."
Like a seagull that plumes her feathers, ere she takes some long flight across the blue sea, the vessel seemed to hesitate and waver, as though uncertain of her course. Striking the long roll of the surf, she quivered and rocked a moment, and then spreading her wings, she took her departure out into that great unknown—the boundless ocean.
CHAPTER XIV CROATAN
For long days and nights we rocked to and fro, rising and falling with the waves, only the blue water stretched around and about us. No vessel, no land in sight, nothing but water, water, water all around, and afar the distant horizon as it seemed to stoop and blend with the ocean.