flames as they
slowly ate their destructive way further and further into the heart of
the doomed craft.

"Were they actually gone?" he asked himself. "Was it possible that he
was left alone, absolutely _alone_ on that burning wreck, thousands of
miles from the nearest land, drifting he knew not whither at the mercy
of wind and wave, with no hope of rescue and with the certainty that in
a day or two at most the fabric which bore him would be so completely
enveloped in the flames kindled by his own clumsiness that it would no
longer be tenable, and the only alternative open to him would be that of
perishing in the fire or flinging himself into the sea, there to battle
despairingly for an extra hour or two of life?" He could not believe
it, he _would_ not believe it possible that men could be found so
inhuman as to leave a fellow-mortal in so desperate a strait; they were
only trying him, as they had tried that poor fellow Thomson; and if he
would but have patience to wait until the stipulated half-hour had
passed, he would find them still there, waiting to receive him into the
boat. He laughed aloud, as he thought what a fool he had been to allow
himself to be terrified even for a moment, but the laugh was so utterly
the reverse of mirthful, so harsh and ghastly, that he stopped abruptly,
startled by the hideous strangeness of the sounds. Then he rose and
crept on tip-toe towards the saloon-door, and, on reaching it, crouched
down and applied first his eye and then his ear to the key-hole. The
key had been removed from the lock and the shield had fallen down over
the opening outside, so that he was unable to see anything; neither
could he detect any sounds indicative of the presence of others on
board. Once or twice indeed he _thought_ he caught the sound of
whispered voices just outside the door, but he could not be sure about
the matter; and in an agony of uncertainty he crept back to the sofa to
watch the lagging minute-hand of the clock, and wait for the expiration
of the half-hour.

Oh! what a weary time was that for the lonely watcher, as he sat there
with his hands tightly locked together, his frame quivering with anxiety
and apprehension, and his eyes fixed upon that inexorable minute-hand,
which would not hasten its movement, though his life might be dependent
on it. What if the men should grow weary of waiting? A thousand
horrible fancies crowded in upon him, until in his distraction he
groaned aloud.