A puff, slightly stronger than usual, struck us just then.The boat was caught as it obliquely crossed the crest of a wave.It went over suddenly, burying its gunwale level with the sea and shipping a bucketful or so of water.I was opening a can of tongue at the moment, and I sprang to the sheet and cast it off just in time.The sail flapped and fluttered, and the boat paid off.A few minutes of regulating sufficed to put it on its course again, when I returned to the preparation of breakfast.
"It does very well, it seems, though I am not versed in things nautical,"she said, nodding her head with grave approval at my steering contrivance.
"But it will serve only when we are sailing by the wind," explained.
"When running more freely, with the wind astern, abeam, or on the quarter, it will be necessary for me to steer.""I must say I don't understand your technicalities," she said, "but I do your conclusion, and I don't like it.You cannot steer night and day and forever.So I shall expect, after breakfast, to receive my first lesson.
And then you shall lie down and sleep.We'll stand watches just as they do on ships.""I don't see how I am to teach you," I made protest."I am just learning for myself.You little thought when you trusted yourself to me that I had had no experience whatever with small boats.This is the first time I have ever been in one.""Then we'll learn together, sir.And since you've had a night's start you shall teach me what you have learned.And now, breakfast.My! this air does give one an appetite!""No coffee," I said regretfully, passing her buttered sea- biscuits and a slice of canned tongue."And there will be no tea, no soups, nothing hot, till we have made land somewhere, somehow."After the ****** breakfast, capped with a cup of cold water, Maud took her lesson in steering.In teaching her I learned quite a deal myself, though I was applying the knowledge already acquired by sailing the Ghost and by watching the boat-steerers sail the small boats.She was an apt pupil, and soon learned to keep the course, to luff in the puffs and to cast off the sheet in an emergency.
Having grown tired, apparently, of the task, she relinquished the oar to me.I had folded up the blankets, but she now proceeded to spread them out on the bottom.When all was arranged snugly, she said:
"Now, sir, to bed.And you shall sleep until luncheon.Till dinner-time,"she corrected, remembering the arrangement on the Ghost.
What could I do? She insisted, and said, "Please, please," whereupon I turned the oar over to her and obeyed.I experienced a positive sensuous delight as I crawled into the bed she had made with her hands.The calm and control which were so much a part of her seemed to have been communicated to the blankets, so that I was aware of a soft dreaminess and content, and of an oval face and brown eyes framed in a fisherman's cap and tossing against a background now of gray cloud, now of gray sea, and then I was aware that I had been asleep.
I looked at my watch.It was one o'clock.I had slept seven hours! And she had been steering seven hours! When I took the steering-oar I had first to unbend her cramped fingers.Her modicum of strength had been exhausted, and she was unable even to move from her position.I was compelled to let go the sheet while I helped her to the nest of blankets and chafed her hands and arms.
"I am so tired," she said, with a quick intake of the breath and a sigh, drooping her head wearily.
But she straightened it the next moment."Now don't scold, don't you dare scold," she cried with mock defiance.
"I hope my face does not appear angry," I answered seriously; "for Iassure you I am not in the least angry."
"N -- no," she considered."It looks only reproachful.""Then it is an honest face, for it looks what I feel.You were not fair to yourself, nor to me.How can I ever trust you again?"She looked penitent."I'll be good," she said, as a naughty child might say it."I promise -- ""To obey as a sailor would obey his captain?""Yes," she answered."It was stupid of me, I know.""Then you must promise something else," I ventured.
"Readily."
"That you will not say, `Please, please,' too often; for when you do you are sure to override my authority."She laughed with amused appreciation.She, too, had noticed the power of the repeated "please.""It is a good word -- " I began.
"But I must not overwork it," she broke in.
