CHAPTER XXI.

We will return to Reine Charteris on that terrible night of fire and flood, when, with all the deathless devotion of a true woman's heart she sacrificed herself to save her husband and her friend.

In the minute before the life-boat came into sight Reine's mind had been comparatively calm and contented.

Though she believed that certain death stared her in the face, it had no special terrors for her. Her life had been good and pure, and she had no dread of the hereafter.

The thought of dying with the husband she loved had a strange, romantic sweetness for her heart.

In the bright and awful glare of light thrown upon the waters by the burning ship, her pale and lovely face had upon it an expression of rapt and Heavenly sweetness and content, untouched by dread or fear.

Vane's arm was drawn around her, and they were slowly swimming about and looking for some drifting desperate hope of rescue.

A few minutes ago the black waves, weirdly illumined by the red glare of the flames, had been filled with a writhing, despairing, shrieking mass of anguished humanity, but now they had all disappeared. Some had floated off to a distance, some had sunk beneath the waves and found a watery grave--

"Unknelled, uncoffined, and unsung."

Vane and Reine were quite alone for a moment--alone, and drawn seemingly nearer together than they had ever been in life by the deadly peril that menaced them. They had made up their minds to death. Both were good swimmers, but they were too far from land for their strength and skill to avail. They clung together, each feeling instinctively that death would be less hard if shared together.

At that moment one of the life-boats that had been seized upon in the first moments of peril by a fortunate few, came in sight of them. It was crowded, already, but one manly heart saw and pitied the terrible case of the two victims. He shouted that they would make room for one more--they would take the woman in.

"Come, Reine, they will save you, my darling," Vane Charteris cried out, tenderly and joyfully, yet with the solemnity of a last farewell in his eyes, as he drew his young wife forward.

But with a sudden cry of anguish, the girl resisted him.

The bare thought of forsaking her husband and leaving him to die alone, was more bitter than death. With that thought came the remembrance of the precious paper she had crossed the sea to win from Vane's vengeful keeping.

"Let me save you--remember you have Maud's precious paper," she cried out, hoarsely, and pushing him frantically from her with both extended hands, she sank down--down into the depths of the sea. They waited a moment, but she did not rise again, and seeing that Vane had lost consciousness, they drew him into the life-boat, and in the efforts to revive him, they soon drifted out of sight of the spot where the devoted girl had disappeared beneath the fire-illumined waves.

In the meantime Reine, who was really a strong and expert swimmer, had only dived beneath the waves, and had come up again in a few seconds later at a different spot where, herself unseen, she could behold the life-boat with its living freight drifting swiftly out of her yearning sight. She had freely given her one chance of life to her husband, but with the thought that he would live there was born in her own young heart an agonizing desire for life. She loved Vane so dearly that she could not bear to leave him in the bright, gay world, and go down to death alone. Though not regretting that she had saved her husband by so great a sacrifice, she breathed a silent, fervent, yet seemingly hopeless prayer, that she might also be rescued and restored to him.

Yet who can tell how often God is near, listening to the wild appeals of those who, despairing of human help, cry out to Heaven. Alone in the wide waste of the ocean, with the midnight stars shining down upon her like the pitying eyes of angels, a friendly plank drifted to her reach. She clutched it eagerly with her hands, threw herself upon, and embraced it with her bruised and weary arms. Now she felt, with a thrill of hope, that there was at least one plank between her and eternity.

The night wore on. Wind and tide bore her far away from the terrible burning ship that towered aloft like a ghastly funeral pyre, throwing its awful glare far and wide upon the sea.

Tossed hither and yon, bruised and buffeted by the heavy waves, the slender form of the fair young girl still held in its breast the faint spark of life, though looking forward to death as inevitable, and drawing nearer and nearer.

* * * * *

The blushing rose of dawn opened its petals at last. The morning light glimmered palely in the east. It shone upon a deathly-white face with pale lips, half apart, and eye-lids closed in unconsciousness, with the long, thick lashes lying on the cheek like to "rays of darkness."

At that moment a small sailing-vessel hove in sight. The floating plank with its precious burden was sighted by the pilot, and in a few minutes more the unfortunate girl was safe on deck.

The crew gathered around her, filled with wonder and curiosity at the sight of the beautiful ocean-waif.

"She is dead," said the mate, with a sorrowful shake of the head.

"I do not think so," said the captain, decidedly. "Look at her right temple. You see it still bleeding from a slight wound that must have been received from something that has struck her in the water. She has been stunned by it, perhaps, and will revive presently. Call Doctor Franks."

Doctor Franks came and agreed with the captain. The girl was not dead, but there was no telling how soon she would be, from the bad effects of her exposure in the water, and the jagged wound on her head.

"A bed must be prepared for her at once, and I will see what I can do towards resuscitating her," said the kind-hearted Doctor Franks.