think of it." He put the MS. in the breast-pocket of his jacket; I
remember perfectly his thin brown fingers folding it lengthwise. "I
will read it tomorrow," he remarked, seizing the door-handle, and then,
watching the roll of the ship for a propitious moment, he opened the
door and was gone. In the moment of his exit I heard the sustained
booming of the wind, the swish of the water on the decks of the Torrens,
and the subdued, as if distant, roar of the rising sea. I noted the
growing disquiet in the great restlessness of the ocean, and responded
professionally to it with the thought that at eight o'clock, in another
half-hour or so at the furthest, the top-gallant sails would have to
come off the ship.

Next day, but this time in the first dog-watch, Jacques entered my
cabin. He had a thick, woollen muffler round his throat and the MS. was
in his hand. He tendered it to me with a steady look but without a word.
I took it in silence. He sat down on the couch and still said nothing.
I opened and shut a drawer under my desk, on which a filled-up log-slate
lay wide open in its wooden frame waiting to be copied neatly into the
sort of book I was accustomed to write with care, the ship's log-book. I
turned my back squarely on the desk. And even then Jacques never
offered a word. "Well, what do you say?" I asked at last. "Is it worth
finishing?" This question expressed exactly the whole of my thoughts.

"Distinctly," he answered in his sedate, veiled voice and then coughed a
little.

"Were you interested?" I inquired further almost in a whisper.

"Very much!"