thing of white and gilding--floated at anchor.
Lois shook out the sail in her character of manager, seated herself at
the helm, and they drifted out. No word was spoken; the light in her
eyes grew brighter and brighter; the scarlet curves of her mouth more
and more intense. Sitting with face turned away from the west, she did
not see, as he did, the rising blackness. The wind freshened, skimming
in fitful gusts over the waves, and the little craft flung off the spray
like rain. Away off in the shadow of the cloud the water was black as
death, a faint line of white defining its edge. Was she infatuated? As
for him, he grew very calm, with a kind of desperation. Better to die
so, with her face the last sight on earth--his last consciousness her
clinging arms, sinking down to the dark, still caverns beneath--than to
live out the life that lay before him. He leaned forward and looked over
into the green depths of the sea. Sunshine still struck down in rippling
lines, a golden network. Soft emerald shadows hung far down, breaking up
into surface rifts of cool dimness as the waves swung over them.

Her hat had fallen back; her whole face was alive with a proud, exultant
delight in the exhilarating motion. Higher and higher rose the veil of
cloud, and the blackness in the water was creeping toward them. Sea
birds wheeled low about them, with their peculiar quavering cry, and a
low swell made itself felt. Miss Berkeley turned her head; a sudden look
of affright blanched her face to deadliest whiteness. A hand's breadth
of clear sky lay beneath the sun, and down after them, with the speed of
a racer, came that great black wave. Before it the blue ripples shivered
brightly; behind it the angry water tossed and seethed. In its bosom,
lurid, phosphorescent lights seemed to flit to and fro. Its crest was
ragged and white with dashes of foam. She took in the whole in a
second's glance, and made a movement to bring the boat's head up to the
wind. As the white face turned toward him, a quick instinct of
self-preservation seized him, and he sprang up to lower the sail.
Something caught the halliards. His left arm was of little service; his
right hung useless at his side. She reached forward--one hand on the
tiller--to help him. The rim of the storm slipped up over the sun--a
sudden flaw struck them--the rudder flew sharp round, wrenched out of
her slight hold--the top-heavy sail caught the full force of the blow,
surged downward with a h