hild at his mother's knee--and then, while the tempest roared around
him, gathered up his strength to meet the end which seemed inevitable.
At any rate he would die like a man.

Then came a reaction. His vital forces rose again. He no longer felt
fearful, he only wondered with a strange impersonal wonder, as a man
wonders about the vital affairs of another. Then from wondering about
himself he began to wonder about the girl who sat opposite to him. With
the rain came a little lightning, and by the first flash he saw her
clearly. Her beautiful face was set, and as she bent forward searching
the darkness with her wide eyes, it wore, he thought, an almost defiant
air.

The canoe twisted round somewhat. He dug his broken paddle into the
water and once more brought her head on to the sea. Then he spoke.

"Are you afraid?" he asked of Beatrice.

"No," she answered, "I am not afraid."

"Do you know that we shall probably be drowned?"

"Yes, I know it. They say the death is easy. I brought you here. Forgive
me that. I should have tried to row you ashore as you said."

"Never mind me; a man must meet his fate some day. Do not think of
me. But I can't keep her head on much longer. You had better say your
prayers."

Beatrice bent forward till her head was quite near his own. The wind had
blown some of her hair loose, and though he did not seem to notice it at
the time, he remembered afterwards that a lock of it struck him on the
face.

"I cannot pray," she said; "I have nothing to pray to. I am not a
Christian."

The words struck him like a blow. It seemed so awful to think of
this proud and brilliant woman, now balanced on the verge of what she
believed to be utter annihilation. Even the courage that induced her at
such a moment to confess her hopeless state seemed awful.

"Try," he said with a gasp.

"No," she answered, "I do not fear to die. Death cannot be worse than
life is for most of us. I have not prayed for years, not since--well,
never mind. I am not a coward. It would be cowardly to pray now because
I may be wrong. If there is a God who knows all, He will understand
that."

Geoffrey said no more, but laboured at the broken paddle gallantly and
with an ever-failing strength. The lightning had passed away and the
darkness was very great, for the hurrying clouds hid the starlight.
Presently a sound arose above the turmoil of the storm, a crashing
thunderous sound towards which the send of the sea gradually