my habit to worry a man. I gave you a signal, and you didn't respond at
first. Well, we have come within hail again; and now, don't you think
that you might help to straighten this tangle, and try to arrange a
reconciliation between those two?

"The scheme is worth trying. Nobody need know but you and me. It
wouldn't be much of a sacrifice to her to give him a taste of the thing
she swore to do--how does it run?--'to have and to hold from this day
forward'?--I can't recall it; but it's whether the wind blows fair or
foul, or the keel scrapes the land or gives to the rock, till the sea
gulps one of 'em down for ever. That's the sense of the thing, Marmion,
and the contract holds between the two, straight on into the eternal
belly. Whatever happens, a husband is a husband, and a wife a wife. It
seems to me that, in the sight of Heaven, it's he that's running fair in
the teeth of the wind, every timber straining, and she that's riding with
it, well coaled, flags flying, in an open channel, and passing the
derelict without so much as, 'Ahoy there!'"

Now, at this distance of time, I look back, and see Hungerford, "the
rowdy sailor," as he called himself, lying there, his dark grey eyes
turned full on me; and I am convinced that no honester, more sturdy-
minded man ever reefed a sail, took his turn upon the bridge, or walked
the dry land in the business of life. It did not surprise me, a year
after, when I saw in public prints that he was the hero of--but that must
be told elsewhere. I was about to answer him then as I knew he would
wish, when a steward appeared and said: "Mr. Boyd, 116 Intermediate,
wishes you would come to him, sir, if you would be so kind."

Hungerford rose, and, as I made ready to go, urged quietly: "You've got
the charts and soundings, Marmion, steam ahead!" and, with a swift but