yet fresher came the sweet wind. It was a
sort of consolation to Elizabeth, that her distress gave
Winthrop a right and a reason to attend upon her; she had had
all along a vague feeling of it, and the feeling was very
present now. It was all of comfort she could lay hold of; and
she clutched at it with even then a foreboding sense of the
desolation there would be when that comfort was gone. She had
it now; she had it, and she held it; and she sat there in her
chair on the deck in a curious half stupor, half quiet, her
mind clinging to that one single point where it could lean.

There came a break-up however. Supper was declared to be
ready; and though nobody but Winthrop attended the skipper's
table, Elizabeth was obliged to take some refreshments of her
own, along with a cup of the sloop's tea, which most certainly
she would have taken from no hand but the one that presented
it to her. And after it, Elizabeth was so strongly advised to
go to the cabin and take some rest, that she could not help
going; resting, she had no thought of. Her companions were of
easier mind; for they soon addressed themselves to such
sleeping conveniencies as the little cabin could boast. Miss
Haye watched them begin and end their preparations and bestow
themselves in resting positions to sleep; and then drawing a
breath of comparative rest herself, she placed herself just
within the cabin threshold, on the floor, where she could look
out and have a good view of the deck through the partly open
door.

It was this night as on the former occasion, a brilliant
moonlight; and the vessel had no lamps up to hinder its power.
The mast and sails and lines stood out in sharp light and
shadow. The man at the helm Elizabeth could not see; the
moonlight poured down upon Winthrop, walking slowly back and
forth on the deck, his face and figure at every turn given
fully and clearly to view. Elizabeth herself was in shadow; he
could not look within the cabin door and see her; she could
look out and see him right well, and she did. He was pacing
slowly up and down, with a thoughtful face, but so calm in its
thoughtfulness that it was a grievous contrast to Elizabeth's
own troubled and tossed nature. It was all the more
fascinating to her gaze; while it was bitter to her
admiration. The firm quiet tread, -- the manly grave repose of
the face, -- spoke of somewhat in the character and life so
unlike what she knew in her own, and so beautiful to her sense