Chapter 22

"She made good view of me; indeed so much,
That sure, methought, her eyes had lost her tongue,
For she did speak in starts, distractedly."

_Twelfth Night._

Though most of the crew of the "Dolphin" slept, either in their hammocks
or among the guns, there were bright and anxious eyes still open in a
different part of the vessel. The Rover had relinquished his cabin to Mrs
Wyllys and Gertrude, from the moment they entered the ship; and we shall
shift the scene to that apartment, (already sufficiently described to
render the reader familiar with the objects it contained), resuming the
action of the tale at an early part of the discourse just related in the
preceding chapter.

It will not be necessary to dwell upon the feelings with which the female
inmates of the vessel had witnessed the disturbances of that day; the
conjectures and suspicions to which they gave rise may be apparent in what
is about to follow. A mild, soft light fell from the lamp of wrought and
massive silver that was suspended from the upper deck, obliquely upon the
painfully pensive countenance of the governess, while a few of its
strongest rays lighted the youthful bloom, though less expressive because
less meditative lineaments, of her companion. The background was occupied,
like a dark shadow in a picture, by the dusky form of the slumbering
Cassandra. At the moment when we see fit to lift the curtain on this quiet
scene of our drama, the pupil was speaking, seeking, in the averted eyes
of her instructress, that answer to her question which the tongue of the
latter appeared reluctant to accord.

"I repeat, my dearest Madam," said Gertrude, "that the fashion of these
ornaments, no less than their materials, is extraordinary in a ship."

"And what would you infer from the same?"

"I know not. Still I would that we were safe in the house of my father."

"God grant it! It may be imprudent to be longer silent.--Gertrude,
frightful, horrible suspicions have been engendered in my mind by what we
have this day witnessed."

The cheek of the maiden blanched, and the pupil of her soft eye
contracted, with alarm, while she seemed to demand an explanation with
every disturbed lineament of her countenance.

"I have long been familiar with the usages of a vessel of war," continued
the governess, who had only paused in order to review the causes of her
suspicions in her own mind; "but never have I seen such customs as, each
hour, unfold themselves in this vessel."

"Of what do you suspect her?"

The look of deep, engrossing, maternal anxiety, that the lovely
interrogator received in reply to this question,