u in a sentence. They are all
sympathetic, and human sympathy is necessary to me until my purpose is
fulfilled."

"You do not look to me for any measure of this sympathy, I trust?"

"I do not. You are antipathetic."

"I am."

"But necessary, all the same."

"So be it, until the proper time shall come."

"It will never come," Brande said firmly.

"We shall see," I replied as firmly as himself.

Next evening as we were steaming down the blue waters--deep blue they
always seemed to me--of the Red Sea, I was sitting on the foredeck
smoking and trying to think. I did not notice how the time passed. What
seemed to me an hour at most, must have been three or four. With the
exception of the men of the crew who were on duty, I was alone, for the
heat was intense, and most of our people were lying in their cabins
prostrated in spite of the wind-sails which were spread from every port
to catch the breeze. My meditations were as usual gloomy and despondent.
They were interrupted by Miss Metford. She joined me so noiselessly that
I was not aware of her presence until she laid her hand on my arm. I
started at her touch, but she whispered a sharp warning, so full of
suppressed emotion that I instantly recovered a semblance of unconcern.

The girl was very white and nervous. This contrast from her usual
equanimity was disquieting. She clung to me hysterically as she gasped:

"Marcel, it is a mercy I have found you alone, and that there is one
sane man in this shipful of lunatics."

"I am afraid you are not altogether right," I said, as I placed a seat
for her close to mine. "I can hardly be sane when I am a voluntary
passenger on board this vessel."

"Do you really think they mean what they say?" she asked hurriedly,
without noticing my remark.

"I really think they have discovered the secret of extraordinary natural
forces, so powerful and so terrible that no one can say what they may or
may not accomplish. And that is the reason I begged you not to come on
this voyage."

"What was the good of asking me not to come without giving me some
reason?"

"Had I done so, they might have killed you as they have done others
before."

"You might have chanced that, seeing that it will probably end that
way."

"And they would certainly have killed me."

"Ah!"

I wondered at the sudden intensity of the girl's sharp gasp when I said
this, and marvelled too, how she, who had always been so mannish,
nestled close to me and a