ame rolling water, and obscuring fog. My strength began to fail, hope
left me as I sank deeper and deeper into the remorseless grip of the
sea. There was nothing left to fight for, to struggle after; the fog
about me became red and purple before my straining eyes, and then
slowly grew black; my muscles refused to respond to my will; I no
longer swam, but floated so low in water the crest of the waves swept
over my face. I no longer cared, gripped by a strange, almost
delicious languor. I was not afraid; my lips uttered no cry, no
prayer--I drifted out into total unconsciousness and went down.

CHAPTER XXV

THE OPEN BOAT

I came back to a consciousness of pain and illness, unable at once to
realize where I was, or feel any true sense of personality. I seemed
to be floating through the air, aware dimly of suffering, but
helplessly in the grasp of some power beyond all struggling against.
Then slowly I comprehended that I rested in a boat, tossed about by a
fairly heavy sea; that it was night and there were stars visible in
the sky overhead. I stared at these, vacant of thought, wondering at
their gleam, when a figure seemed to lean over me, and I caught the
outline of a face, gazing eagerly down into my own. Instantly memory
came back in a flash--this was not death, but life; I was in a boat
with her, I could not move my hands, and my voice was but a hoarse
whisper.

"Mistress Fairfax--Dorothy!"

"Yes--yes," swiftly. "It is all right, but you must lie still.
Watkins, Captain Carlyle is conscious. What shall I do?"

He must have been behind us at the steering oar, for his gruff, kindly
voice sounded very close.

"Yer might lift him up, miss," he said soberly. "He'll breathe better.
How's that, Captain?"

"Much easier," I managed to breathe. "I guess I am all right now. You
fished me out?"

"Sam did. He got a boat hook in your collar. We cast off when yer
went overboard, and cruised about in the fog hunting fer yer. Who was
it yer was fightin' with, sir?"

"LeVere."

"That's what I told the lads. He's a goner, I reckon?"

"I never saw him after we sank. Are all the men here?"

"All but those in the forward boat, sir. They got away furst, an' we
ain't had no sight ov 'em since. Maybe we will when it gets daylight."

"Who had charge?"

"Harwood, sir; he's the best man o' ther lot, an' a good sailor, I
give him a compass, an' told him ter steer west. Wus thet right?"

"All I could have told him,"