smoke from the
saloonkeepers' cigars became more than Vandover could stand. His stomach
turned, at every instant he gagged and choked. He suddenly made up his
mind that he could stand it no longer, and determined to go on deck,
preferring to walk the night out rather than spend it in the cabin. He
drew on his shoes without lacing them, and dressed himself hurriedly,
omitting his collar and scarf; he put his hat on his tumbled hair, swung
into his overcoat, and, wrapping his travelling-rug around him, started
up toward the deck. On the stairs he was seized with such a nausea that
he could hardly keep from vomiting where he stood, but he rushed out
upon the lower deck, gaining the rail with a swimming head.

He sank back upon an iron capstan with a groan, weak and trembling, his
eyes full of tears, a bursting feeling in his head. He was utterly
miserable.

It was about half-past two in the morning, and a cold raw wind was
whistling through the cordage and flinging the steamer's smoke down upon
the decks and upon the water like a great veil of crepe. A sickly
half-light was spread out between the sea and the heavens. By its means
he could barely distinguish great, livid blotches of fog or cloud
whirling across the black sky, and the unnumbered multitude of
white-topped waves rushing past, plunging and rising like a vast herd of
black horses galloping on with shaking white manes. Low in the northeast
horizon lay a long pale blur of light against which the bow of the
steamer, inky black, rose and fell and heaved and sank incessantly. To
the landward side and very near at hand, so near that he could hear the
surf at their feet, the long procession of hills continually defiled,
vague and formless masses between the sea and sky. The wind, the noise
of the waves rushing past, the roll of the breakers and the groaning of
the cordage all blended together and filled the air with a prolonged
minor note, lamentable beyond words. The atmosphere was cold and damp,
the spray flying like icy bullets. The sombre light that hung over the
sea reflected itself in long blurred streaks upon the wet decks and
slippery iron rods. Here and there about the rigging a tremulous ball of
orange haze showed where the ship's lanterns were swung. Directly under
him in the stern the screw snarled incessantly in a vortex of boiling
water that forever swirled away and was lost in the darkness. From time
to time the indicator of the patent log, just beside