She is again the dutiful ward of the King, the
Lady Jocelyn Leigh - she hath asked to be so called" -
"You lie," I said. "She is my true and noble wife. She may sit in the
state cabin, in the air and warmth and light, she may even laugh
with her lips, but her heart is here with me in the hold."
As I spoke, I knew, and knew not how I knew, that the thing which
I had said was true. With that knowledge came a happiness so deep
and strong that it swept aside like straw the torment of those cords,
and the deeper hurt that I lay at his feet. I suppose my face altered,
and mirrored that blessed glow about my heart, for into his own
came a white fury, changing its beauty into something inhuman
and terrifying. He looked a devil baffled. For a minute he stood
there rigid, with hands clenched. "Embrace her heart, if thou
canst," he said, in a voice so low that it came like a whisper from
the realm he might have left. "I shall press my face against her
bosom."
Another minute of a silence that I disdained to break; then he
turned and went up the ladder. The seamen and the master
followed. The hatch was clapped to and fastened, and we were left
to the darkness and the heavy air, and to a grim endurance of what
could not be cured.
During those hours of thirst and torment I came indeed to know
the man who sat beside me.
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