"Oh, perfectly!" she answered him.
As she said it there was an outcry, a sudden lurch of the vessel, a
flapping of the sails and ropes, and a vast shadow swept by them, the
hull of a huge steamer, so near that they could almost have touched it
with an outstretched hand. But as it ploughed its way on and left them
unharmed and rocking on its great waves, Reyburn released her from the
arm he had flung about her in the moment's dismay--the arm that had
never folded her before, that never did again.
"Oh no! no!" sighed Lilian with a shiver as she quickly drew
away--"not perfectly, oh not perfectly! That is impossible here, where
that black death can at any moment extinguish all our light."
"Be still! be still!" said Reyburn. "Why do you speak of it?" he cried
roughly. "Isn't it enough to know that some day it must come?--
"The iron hand that breaks our band,
It breaks my bliss--it breaks my heart!"
He left her side in a sudden agitation a moment, and walked the deck
again; and before he turned about Lilian had slipped below.
The next afternoon the Beachbird anchored within sight of shore and
outside a long low reef where they saw a palm-plume tossing, and a
boat came off, bringing Helen and her father.
John, who had begun at last to find his sea-legs, stood as eager and
impatient to welcome the new-comers, while every dip of the shining
oars lessened the distance between them, as if the cruise were just
beginning; but Lilian, in the evening shadow behind him, knew that her
share in the cruise was over.
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