"Mackerel, I think," he said, and promptly knocked it on the head, to end its troubles and allow him the further use of his hook.

"The poor little thing! I'm so sorry," she said, looking mournfully down at the iridescent beauty. "I don't think I like fishing."

"You'll think better of it when it's fried."

"I couldn't touch it," with a vigorous shake of the head.

So he asked her to go down and make some cakes, and then caught another fish of a different kind the moment the bait reached the water, and a couple more for breakfast next day, and was thereby much rea.s.sured as to the future of their larder. He cleaned two of his fish and fried them with some pork fat as soon as she had made her cakes, and proceeded to reason her out of her prejudice.

"You have eaten fish all your life, haven't you?" he asked.

"Ye-es."

"Well, every fish has had to be caught before you could eat it. They generally leave them to die. But even that is probably only similar to our drowning, which is said to be about as pleasant a way as there is of going."

"It's horribly cold if you're lashed to a mast,"--with a reminiscent shiver. "And being rubbed back to life is just as bad."

"And we are more merciful, because we kill them at once."

"It's horrible to think that everything we eat, except things that grow of course, has got to suffer death for us."

"But you have always eaten these things without being troubled about it."

"The killing has never been brought home to me so closely before."

"It's Nature's law, you see. Everything feeds on something else.

These fishes feed on smaller things. And how do you know that when you cut a cabbage or a potato----"

"How I wish I had the chance!"

"So do I, most heartily. But how do you know they don't feel it just as much, in their own dull way, as the pig did from which we get our pork?"

She shook her head and sighed. "We can't get away from it, I suppose,"

and tasted the fish and found it good, and ate quite heartily though with an appearance of protest.

"You see," he said. "Some fishes lay millions of eggs at a time. If they all grew up the sea would be choked with them, as the earth would be with animals if they weren't killed off. Besides, unless I am mistaken in my recollection of our old parson's reading, all these things were expressly provided for man's sustenance, so we are only doing our duty in eating them."

"All the same, I think I will let you do all the catching and killing."

"Of course. That is the man's proper part in the family economy. He is the bread-and-meat winner. And the wife's--the woman's, I mean--is to see to the cooking," and he occupied himself busily with fish-bones, and felt like biting his tongue off for its involuntary slip.

"If you had lived on pork and rabbits for months you would find this fish delicious," he said presently, to break the odd little silence that had fallen on them.

"It is very good. I wonder you never caught any before."

"I did try, but my tackle was too rough. The fish would have none of it. It is your clever line that has done the trick."

"I am glad to be of some use, though I can't help being sorry for the fish."

And if he had dared he would have delighted to tell her of what infinitely greater use she was to him in other and higher ways.

x.x.xVIII

Wulfrey was awakened in the night by the sounds he had come to recognise as the accompaniments of bad weather. The ship was humming in the wind and straining and jerking restively at the rusty cable which he was always expecting to give way. He wondered sleepily what would happen to them if it did. Wondered also if The Girl was frightened at the changed conditions, or whether she would understand.

He slipped on some clothes and went into the cabin, to rea.s.sure her if necessary.

The fire was a bed of white ashes and a rose-gold core in the centre.

He piled on some chips and the flames broke out with a cheerful crackle. The door of The Girl's little pa.s.sage way opened an inch or two, and he caught a glimpse of her startled eyes shining in the fire-light.

"I was afraid you might be disturbed by the storm," he said.

She went back for a moment, and then came out with her blanket skirt and cloak swathed about her, and sat down by the fire.

"It woke me, and I cannot get to sleep again. Oh ... what is that?"--as a shrill scream pealed out just above the opening in the companion-hatch.

"It's only those infernal birds. They always come screeching round us in bad weather."

"I had just been dreaming that that horrid man came across in the night and murdered us both. It was such a relief to see you alive again."

"No fear of his venturing out in this weather. Those screaming birds get on his nerves. He'll be sitting drinking, and cursing them in the most awful Gaelic he can twist his tongue to. This weather will probably last a couple of days. Then it will slack up, and just when you're thinking it's all gone it will come back worse than ever.

Fortunately we've got---- By Jove!"--and he ran hastily up the companion, unbolted the door and ran out on deck. The gale came whuffling down on the fire and scattered the white ashes in a cloud, and set the silken drapery of the walls rustling wildly. The shrill clamour of the birds sounded very close, and The Girl sat anxiously wondering.

He came back in a minute, empty-handed and disconsolate. "I just remembered my fish. I left two up there for breakfast, but the birds have had them. They're as thick on the deck as bees on a comb, hoping for more."

"Is that all? I was afraid that man was coming and you'd heard him."

"It means living on pork till the storm pa.s.ses."

"That is nothing. We shall enjoy the other things all the more later on."

"I'm wondering all the time how Macro is getting on----" he said, pulling out his pipe and filling it.

"Why trouble about him? He would not trouble about us if we were starving."

"I don't suppose he would.... I suppose it comes of my being so in the habit of helping people through their bodily troubles."

"It is wasted on him. He would not let you help him if you could."

"I don't believe he would, unless he were helpless.... I wish he'd never come ash.o.r.e."

"But in that case I would not be here either, and you would have been all alone for the rest of your life."

"Then, after all, I'm glad he came ash.o.r.e."

"I wonder if you would have gone mad in time with the loneliness of it," she said musingly.