CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.

"We have had bright weather and dull, we have had smooth seas and rough, and now at last we have fog! It's experience," pronounced Katrine reflectively, "but," she shuddered, "it's an experience I'd as soon be without! There's something eerie and gruesome about sailing through an invisible sea, where there's not even enough air to breathe. One feels shut in! I think I'm a little afraid. Do _you_ like it?"

"I have never met any one who _liked_ a fog at sea, but I am not afraid. There's no need for fear."

Bedford smiled. He had discarded white clothing in favour of a grey suit, a cap to match was pressed down over his head, he was all grey to match the mist, even his skin seemed tinged with the same shade. Katrine shuddered again as she looked him over.

"And you are a mist man. You look unreal, like everything else. I think I am afraid of you, too! I shall go into the ladies' room, and turn on the light, and read."

"No!" Bedford laid his hand on her arm. "You will not! You will sit out here with me in the fog. You can sit in the glare of electric light every day of your life, but a fog on the Indian Ocean is an experience by itself... We are going to share it together. I'm quite real, I assure you, very real. I can take care of you. Come with me!"

His hand slid through her arm, and drew her along; his head was bent over hers, she met his eyes, and felt the protest die upon her lips. Without a word she followed where he led, took the seat pointed out, watched him draw up another, and place himself sideways before her, so as to form a shield between herself and the outer world. His face seemed startlingly near to her own; his hand on the side of his chair almost touched her knees. Katrine fixed her eyes upon it with a fascinated attention. A moment ago it had rested on her arm, the electric warmth of the contact still lingered; for a reckless moment she longed to clasp it, to put it back in its place; then remembrance dawned, and she shuddered again. The world was grey, without and within, nothing but mist and gloom. Seated as they were, she and her companion seemed solitary atoms in a world of fog; to right and left nothing could be seen but dense grey walls which seemed with every moment to press more nearly. The wide deck was empty; instead of the usual babble of talk and laughter there was silence save for the regular thud of the engines, and from time to time the sound of the horn. The effect of that silence was irresistible. Involuntarily the man and woman lowered their voices, and bent nearer; pale face to pale face.

"Are you afraid still?" Bedford whispered, and Katrine shook her head.

"Not afraid. Dazed--a little, I think. It's so unreal. A world of dreams..."

"A world of dreams, and no one in it, but you and me."

His hand was still there, and once again the mad, unreasoning impulse seized her to touch it, to grasp its support. So overmastering was the desire, that the physical effort at restraint left her faint and weak. She leaned back in her seat, and turned her head aside, her cheeks flaming with shame. To what had she come, the reserved, well-disciplined Katrine Beverley, that she should be capable of such a thought! What had become of her modesty, her pride; had she no decency left, no loyalty towards the man who had given her his heart?

Katrine's brain formed bitter reproaches, but the vagrant heart brushed them aside. His hand! His arm! Compared to them all else was as dross. To lay her head for one hour on that broad shoulder, seemed the summit of all that life could give. She felt his eyes following her, searching her face, but dared not meet them. There had been music in the way in which he had spoken those last words; his voice had dropped to a lower note. So had Grizel's beautiful voice deepened, when she had spoken to Martin. To one who had once heard those accents, their meaning was unmistakable. He loved her, and, God help her! she loved him in return with a passion which frightened her by its intensity. She had imagined that she was cold, that for her the raptures of love would be exchanged for a calm and moderate content; for twenty-six years she had preserved an unbroken front, and now all the stored-up forces of her nature arose and clamoured. Katrine realised with horror that her life had passed out of her own control, and lay in the hollow of this man's hand. What he asked of her, she would grant; when he commanded, she would obey. There was no force in her to say him nay. If he claimed her, Jim Blair might go to the winds; all the world might stand on one side, and if this man beckoned from the other she would leave all to follow him... The time of self-deception was past, and with a desperate candour she faced the situation, and considered her own course of action. The only chance of safety lay in flight. Two days more, and the voyage would be over; if she could avoid Bedford for two days, there would be no more _tete-a-tetes_. Dorothea would be present, Jack, Jim Blair--all the little world of the station. Jim had promised a truce of three months. If she could avoid Bedford during that period, her instinct of loyalty would in some sort be appeased. She had promised Jim to keep an open mind for three months, and though his doom was already sealed, she shrank from the thought of putting another man in his place.

Three months' separation and waiting, and then--

"What are you thinking of?" asked Bedford's voice in her ear. So near the voice sounded, so low and gentle, that it was almost like the voice of her own heart, but for all its softness it held an insistence which compelled an answer. Katrine made a gallant effort at confession.

"I was thinking of the man to whom I am--engaged."

"Virtually engaged!" corrected Bedford quietly. "But they were sad thoughts to judge by your face. Why should you have sad thoughts of a good man? It would hurt him to have you think of him so, for of a certainty his chief thought is for your happiness. Shall we dismiss him for the moment?--It's lonely for me here by myself, when you wander away into dreams, and you look so wraith-like and unreal,--a typical spirit of the mist. If I were an artist I should like to paint you now. I wonder if you realise how beautiful you are?"

A glow lighted Katrine's eyes; the glow which warms the heart of every true daughter of Eve who hears herself called fair.

"Am I? I'm glad! I--I think I've grown nicer lately," she replied ingenuously. "At home no one admired me much; not half, not a quarter as much as they did Grizel, who is really hardly pretty at all. She used to laugh at me in the old days and say that I kept my good looks a secret, while she took people by the throat, and bullied them into admiration, but the last time she came down she said--?"

"Yes?"

"She said I had grown `unnecessarily good looking!' and wanted to know `_Why_?' I knew!"

Katrine laughed guiltily. "But I couldn't explain. So I was _cross_."

Bedford looked at her searchingly. For a moment he seemed on the point of repeating Grizel's question, but he checked himself.

"You shan't be cross, and you shan't be sad, so long as I am here to manage for you!" he said confidently, and Katrine, looking at his broad shoulders and grave, purposeful face, felt with a thrill that no harm could indeed approach while this strong man was near.

The dank breath of the fog increased with every moment, driving the passengers into the brightly-lighted saloon, but to Katrine there was a glorious exhilaration in the darkness and the solitude. She realised that in time to come she would look back upon these moments, and treasure them in her heart. When her only meetings with Bedford should be in the crowded festivities of the little station, the isolation of this hour in the fog would live enshrined in memory, to be recalled with a passion of longing.

Silence fell, a silence caused not by poverty of thought, but by thought so charged with import that it dared not risk expression. Katrine felt with a certainty beyond argument that the longing of her own heart was echoed throb for throb, ache for ache by the heart by her side; that even as she desired with a passionate intensity to touch Bedford's hand, and feel the embrace of his arms, so with an ever greater intensity did he also yearn for her. Such convictions are above reason. They are the language of the heart, which to sensitive souls is stronger than that of the lips. As the silence lengthened so did the mental communion grow and deepen, until with each second it appeared inevitable that speech must follow. Already with a mutual impulse they had faced each other, already the two hands had stretched out, when suddenly Bedford turned his head, raising it high, with a gesture alert, questioning, the action of a sentry, threatened with danger. Through the fog Katrine caught the pose, and felt a sympathetic thrill of anxiety. She reared her own head,--could it be fancy that her ear caught a new and unfamiliar sound? She bent forward, her attitude following his. Tense and motionless they peered into the darkness.

"_What is it_?"

Bedford's voice, sharp and vibrant, called out the words, then with a deep cry he flung out his arms, and strained her to his heart.

"_Katrine! Katrine! The End_!"

She clung to him, every pulse in her body suspended in the awful grip of fear, for suddenly, awfully, the menacing sound had taken shape; the shape of a giant hulk which looming through the mist, staggered and crashed, while the thunders of Olympus roared about their ears. Tongues of flame followed the impact, the deck shook and reeled, and from a thousand throats went up a shriek to Heaven. A helpless unit among the number, Katrine stood and looked death in the face. The End indeed, but through it all, the clasp of a strong man's arms!

Mercifully it is not to one man in ten thousand that there comes so terrific an experience, and those who make the exception are as a rule incapable of describing their sensations at the dread moment, for even as a mortal wound deadens the physical sensations, so does an overwhelming shock paralyse the mind. Consider it in cold blood, one moment, ye who read, seated comfortably in your homes,--a mysterious thunder crashing suddenly into ordered silence; the shivering reel of what has stood as solid ground, but which in a lightning flash is realised to be but a plank between safety and destruction. The heavens have fallen; the earth has rocked; and on all sides tosses the hungry sea... What wonder if, in its turn, the brain reels and loses power.

Katrine was conscious of nothing but an impulse to cling closer and closer, a terror of being separated from Bedford by so much as a second. If he were with her she could face what might come; without him madness was near.

With a second shock, hardly less awesome than the first, the towering mass fell back, and drifted into the fog; the deck shivered and heeled, as the water rushed through the yawning gap.

"All on deck! All on deck!"

The order rang from the bridge, but it was not needed. Already every soul on board the huge vessel was fleeing along the companionways and corridors. If death threatened, at least let it be death in the open, not the death of a rat in a trap! Ghastly and panting they reached the deck; ghastly and panting, but with magnificent control, they stood and waited the word of command from the figure on the bridge. Katrine raised her head from Bedford's shoulder, and gazed into his face. The stewards were pacing the deck, turning on the electric switches. There was one near at hand which lit the two faces with a faint, unearthly light. The blue eyes and the grey gazed into each other, deep, deep, as they had done at the first moment of meeting, but now that gaze held a deeper meaning, a world of revelation, a world of regret!

Katrine had only one desire; she voiced it with the simplicity of a child:

"Stay with me! Don't go away!"

"Never!" he cried, and tightened his grasp. "Whatever happens we're together, Katrine. You're mine. I'll keep you--"

"Lower the boats!"

The order rang out, short and sharp. The stewards were handing round lifebelts. In the brightly-lighted saloons the women were being ranged together. A hand gripped Katrine's arm, and Mrs Mannering's voice rang out, calm and controlled:

"Miss Beverley! That's good. I've been searching for you. Come, my lass, come with me! They are collecting the women in the saloon to be ready for the boats. We must do what we can to help. It's not the first shipwreck I've been in, and here I am, safe and sound. We'll be all right yet, but we must do our share. Come! take my arm."

Katrine lifted a set face.

"I'm not going. Don't tease me, please--there's so little time. Leave us alone."

Over her head the two exchanged rapid glances. Bedford nodded, a quick stern nod, with a glance in the direction of the boat; the woman nodded back, comprehending his message. She was bareheaded, cloakless as she had rushed out of the saloon a moment before; now with characteristic coolness she glanced around, and made a second announcement:

"There's time yet. I can get some clothes and usefuls. You will stay here? Exactly here, so that I may know where to find you? There must be no chance of missing!"

Bedford nodded again, and she hastened away. Prom above sounded the rattle of the wireless, as it sent forth its message of distress. Leaning against the rail stood a youthful officer, little more than a boy. His face was set, but his pose was the acme of careless ease. He had taken from his pocket a silver case, and from time to time he lifted an unlighted cigarette to his lips, with a pathetic pretence of enjoyment. Bedford bent his head until it rested on Katrine's hair.

"Katrine!"

She moved, so that her cheek took the place of her hair. There was unspeakable comfort in the soft, cold touch of his flesh against her own.

"Yes!"

"That's the wireless! They are sending messages for help. We are in the direct channel. It will certainly come. We must hope on."

Even as he spoke the deck shivered beneath his feet, and with a sickening lurch, tilted heavily on one side. Bedford threw out one hand and caught at the rail, holding Katrine firmly with the other. The young officer, thrown on one side, fell back into his nonchalant pose, and tremblingly lifted his cigarette, but his lips moved in an involuntary despair.

"My God! _She's going_--"

Katrine caught the gasping words, and looked death in the face. It was coming. At any moment that shuddering lurch might come again, and the deck glide down into the sea. This man said so, and he _knew_. For the sake of example he preserved an appearance of composure, but he understood, and he despaired. With a sob of emotion she lifted her face to Bedford's, and their lips met in a long, clinging kiss. It mattered nothing that there were people around, that the flaring lights lit up their forms; they were lost to every thought but of themselves and their love. Above the fear, above the terror, there clamoured in Katrine's heart a desperate need of expression. All her life she had been dumb; she could not die without putting in words the one transcendent fact.

"_I love you_!" she cried. "Do you hear? Do you understand? If I must die, let me die in your arms. I tried ... but it was no use--I love _you_! There is nobody else--I belong to you!"

"My Katrine!" he cried trembling. "My girl--"

Prom above, the wonderful invisible machinery rattled and cracked; the first boat swung low from the davits was already being loaded with its complement of shrinking, trembling women. The flare of lights lit up their ashen faces turned up to the deck above as they floated, wraith-like, into the mist. A second boat creaked on the ropes and Mrs Mannering's hand gripped Bedford's arm.

"Now! Bring her along!"

Katrine resisted, but the strong arms bore her along until she stood ranged among the line of waiting women. Nothing but force should induce her to enter a boat alone, but she had not the physical strength to retain her position against the will of her companions.

Mrs Mannering had tied a shawl round her head. The pockets of her coat were filled to the point of bursting. She carried a bundle of small articles, which she proceeded to stuff into the pockets of Katrine's cloak. A steward came up and fastened a lifebelt round her waist. Bedford took a second from his arm and himself fastened it round Katrine. She laid her cold fingers on his, drawing him back.

"You are going to send me away?"

He bent and laid his lips to her hand, but he went on fastening the straps. There was a relentlessness in his movements which struck ice to Katrine's soul.

"You will send me away, and let me die alone?"

At that he winced, but still he continued his task.

"You must go first, beloved. If God wills, I'll follow. The women must go first."

Katrine laughed; a wild reckless laugh more terrible than tears.

"Why? Why? Because of a sentiment, a convention? Better save the men! They are the bread-winners, the heads of households. Save the lives that count, and let us drown. There are women enough--too many. We should not be missed. I have had no choice in life, but my death is my own. I will not go! I will stay with you."

Mrs Mannering's practical, commonplace voice struck sharply upon her ears.

"My good girl," she cried. "You have not to think of yourself at this moment. You are not the only woman who would rather stay behind. Look at those poor souls over there who have to leave husbands and sons! Is it easier for them, or for you? There's only one thing to be done--obey orders, and do your bit towards smoothing the way. When your turn comes, you've _got_ to go, and I'll see to it that you _do_!"

She squared her shoulders, and stationed herself grim and relentless by Katrine's side. In the lurid light her face looked lined, and incredibly old, but she carried herself bravely, and showed not a quiver of fear.

Along the deck the band had marshalled, and the strains of a popular waltz floated with horrible gaiety on the air. Not a note fell flat, or out of time; stalwart and erect in their smart uniform, the men stood and played, and the conductor waved his baton as composedly as if they had been surrounded by a throng of merry dancers, instead of men and women threatened by instant death. Prom within the brightly-lighted smoking-room a man could be seen writing a letter. A few feet away a woman was playing bo-peep with a frightened child. Gradually, as Katrine stood waiting, her fear subsided, and there stole into her soul a mysterious courage and calm. Strung to its highest sensibilities the spirit within her absorbed the atmosphere by which it was surrounded, and nobly answered the call.

Imagine it! Dwell for one moment on the majesty of it--a crowd of men and women, each one braced up to his highest, strongest self; to a _selfless_ self, stifling, for the sake of others, all signs of distress, obeying the ordinary conventions of society, giving place, the stronger to the weaker, with a smile and bow, as if that matter of preference were some society trifle, not a matter of bald life and death.

As surely as the music floated from the mouth of those brazen instruments, as the light streamed from the electric arch overhead, so surely did the spiritual influence of those brave deeds spread over the ship, and touch with fire every human heart.

Into Katrine's soul in its turn stole some portion of this noble fortitude; she ceased to struggle, and stood silently by Bedford's side awaiting her call. The women filed slowly by, were lifted one by one and swung into the boat. Suddenly Bedford turned towards her, grasping both hands. In his face she read that the parting had come.

"Katrine! Good-bye..."

Strong aims seized her, she was lifted high, dropped, and caught. There came to, her aid a merciful unconsciousness...