Chapter 11 - Page 2

while all its glamour had gone with the ship in the night. What more natural! It was tragic enough and funny enough in all conscience to call aloud for compassion, and in what was I better than the rest of us to refuse him my pity? And even as I looked at him the mists rolled into the rent, and his voice spoke-

"'I was so lost, you know. It was the sort of thing one does not expect to happen to one. It was not like a fight, for instance.'

"'It was not,' I admitted. He appeared changed as if he had suddenly matured.

"'One couldn't be sure,' he muttered.

"'Ah! You were not sure,' I said, and was placated by the sound of a faint sigh that passed between us like the flight of a bird in the night.

"'Well, I wasn't,' he said, courageously. 'It was something like that wretched story they made up. it was not a lie- but it wasn't truth all the same. It was something.... One knows a downright lie. There was not the thickness of a sheet of paper between the right and wrong of this affair.'

"'How much more did you want?' I asked; but I think I spoke so low that he did not catch what I said. He had advanced his argument as though life had been a network of paths separated by chasms. His voice sounded reasonable.

"'Suppose I had not- I mean to say, suppose I had stuck to the ship? Well. How much longer? Say a minute- half a minute. Come. In thirty seconds, as it seemed certain then, I would have been overboard; and do you think I would not have laid hold of the first thing that came in my way- oar, life-buoy, grating- anything? Wouldn't you?'

"'And be saved,' I interjected.

"'I would have meant to be,' he retorted. 'And that's more than I meant when I'... he shivered as if about to swallow some nauseous drug... jumped,' he pronounced with a convulsive effort, whose stress, as if propagated by the waves of the air, made my body stir a little in the chair. He fixed me with lowering eyes. 'Don't you believe me?' he cried. 'I swear!... Confound it! You got me here to talk, and... You must! You said you would believe.' 'Of course I do,' I protested in a matter-of-fact tone which produced a calming effect. 'Forgive me,' he said. 'Of course I wouldn't have talked to you about all this if you had not been a gentleman. I ought to have known... I am- I am- a gentleman, too...' 'Yes, yes,' I said, hastily. He was looking me squarely in the face and withdrew his gaze slowly. 'Now you understand why I didn't after all... didn't go out in that way. I wasn't going to be frightened at what I had done. And, anyhow, if I had stuck to the ship I would have done my best to be saved. Men have been known to float for hours- in the open sea- and be picked up not much the worse for it. I might have lasted it out better than many others. There's nothing the matter with my heart.' He withdrew his right fist from his pocket, and the blow he struck on his chest resounded like a muffled