hunder and darkness; but Trafford gazed upon it with a calm face.
Groans and lamentation could not express the agony which rent his
heart, and he walked up and down the drenched sand with a calm, white
face that awed Dirk whenever he looked upon it.

"It be a heavier stroke for the master an' we ken tell, lads," he
said to his comrades, as they kept keen lookout for the poor bodies
which the sea still kept.

"Ay, there be a heart within him like the rest of us," said one of the
fishermen, looking at Trafford as he kept his watchful vigil; "an' he
be only losin' what we hev lost afore."

"But the lad wur not like ours," said Dirk, pityingly, "an' it wur a
finer lad an' ever I see afore."

So they talked as they watched and waited, and the light grew, and
somewhere behind the lowering banks of clouds in the east the sun had
risen, and all the land and sea lay cold and warmthless and forlorn.
Trafford relinquished not his keen search for a moment, fearful lest
the waves should cast his lost treasure at his feet and snatch it back
before he could grasp it. The dear face might be bruised and battered
by the cruel, remorseless sea, and the eyes could never beam upon him
with any light of love or recognition, he thought; yet find it and
look upon it he must, even though the sight agonized him. So he
watched and waited, with his tearless eyes roaming along the line of
foam.

An hour fled. The sea relented, and gave up one poor form into the
fishermen's hands. Trafford walked calmly out to where the men were
bending over it with pale, awed faces, and saw that it was not Noll.
He shivered, looking at the skipper's stalwart figure, and wondered
whether, if the sailor but had the power of speech, he might not tell
him something of his boy,--whether he met death's dark face calmly and
fearlessly, and whether he sent a message to those whom he saw on the
shore and could not call to. This thought gave him fresh anguish. If
Noll had sent him a farewell,--a last message,--oh, what would he not
give to hear it? But, if that were really the case, it had died with
those to whom it was intrusted. The sea would never whisper it,--the
dead could not. He went back to his lonely pacing.

Another long, long hour passed. The bit of wreck that was jammed
between the rocks went to pieces and came ashore. Ben's mate came with
it, but no Noll. The men began to straggle homeward, weary and worn
with the night's vigil, till only Dirk