Suddenly, fixing me with his unnatural, wakeful glare, he whispered
something which I could not understand, and then darted forward even
more rapidly, as if he dreaded that, in merely speaking, he had lost
time.
Still the ship drove on, and I walked hurriedly along the deck, just
behind my companion. But our speed and that of the ship contrasted
strangely with the mouldy smell of old rigging, and the listless and
lazy groups, smoking and leaning on the bulwarks. The seasons, in
endless succession and iteration, passed over the ship. The twilight
was summer haze at the stern, while it was the fiercest winter mist at
the bows. But as a tropical breath, like the warmth of a Syrian day,
suddenly touched the brow of my companion, he sighed, and I could not
help saying:
"You must be tired."
He only shook his head and quickened his pace. But now that I had
once spoken, it was not so difficult to speak, and I asked him why he
did not stop and rest.
He turned for moment, and a mournful sweetness shone in his dark eyes
and haggard, swarthy face. It played flittingly around that strange
look of ruined human dignity, like a wan beam of late sunset about a
crumbling and forgotten temple.
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