"THE SEA IS A TYRANT"

Ken stumbled into the open door of Applegate Farm at three the next morning. Felicia was asleep in a chair by the cold ashes of the fire. A guttering candle burned on the table. She woke instantly and stared at him with wide eyes.

"What is it?" she said, and then sprang up. "Alone?"

"Yes," Ken said. "Not yet. I'm going back in a little while. I wanted to tell you how everybody is working, and all."

She ran to bring him something to eat, while he flung himself down before the hearth, dead tired.

"The fog's still down heavy," he said, when she came back. "The coast guard's been out all night. There are men on shore, too, and some other little boats."

"But the tide was running out," Phil said. "He's gone. Kirk's--gone, Ken!"

"No," Ken said, between his teeth. "No, Phil. Oh, no, no!". He got up and shook himself. "Go to bed, now, and sleep. The idea of sitting up with a beastly cold candle!"

He kissed her abruptly and unexpectedly and stalked out at the door, a weary, disheveled figure, in the first pale, fog-burdened gleam of dawn.

It was some time after the Flying Dutchman parted her one insufficient mooring-rope before Kirk realized that the sound of the water about her had changed from a slap to a gliding ripple. There was no longer the short tug and lurch as she pulled at her painter and fell back; there was no longer the tide sound about the gaunt piles of the wharf. Kirk, a little apprehensive, stumbled aft and felt for the stern-line. It gave in his hand, and the slack, wet length of it flew suddenly aboard, smacking his face with its cold and slimy end. He knew, then, what had happened, but he felt sure that the boat must still be very near the wharf--perhaps drifting up to the rocky shore between the piers. He clutched the gunwale and shouted: "Ken! Oh, Ken!" He did not know that he was shouting in exactly the wrong direction, and the wind carried his voice even farther from shore. His voice sounded much less loud than he had expected. He tried calling Felicia's name, but it seemed even less resonant than Ken's. He stopped calling, and stood listening. Nothing but the far-off fog-siren, and the gulls' faint cries overhead. The wind was blowing fresher against his cheek, for the boat was in mid-channel by this time. The fog clung close about him; he could feel it on the gunwale, wet under his hands; it gathered on his hair and trickled down his forehead. The broken rope slid suddenly off the stern sheets and twined itself clammily about his bare knee. He started violently, and then picked it off with a shiver.

The slack length of it flew suddenly aboard

The lighthouse siren, though still distant, sounded nearer, which meant that the boat was drifting seaward. Kirk realized that, all at once, and gave up his shouting altogether. He sat down in the bottom of the boat, clasped his knees, and tried to think. But it was not easy to think. He had never in his life wanted so much to see as he did now. It was so different, being alone in the dark, or being in it with Ken or Felicia or the Maestro on the kind, warm, friendly land. He remembered quite well how the Maestro had said: "The sea is a tyrant. Those she claims, she never releases."

The sea's voice hissed along the side of the boat, now,--the voice of a monster ready to leap aboard,--and he couldn't see to defend himself! He flung his arms out wildly into his eternal night, and then burst suddenly into tears. He cried for some time, but it was the thought of Ken which made him stop. Ken would have said, "Isn't there enough salt water around here already, without such a mess of tears?"

That was a good idea--to think about Ken. He was such a definite, solid, comforting thing to think about. Kirk almost forgot the stretch of cold gray water that lay between them now. It wasn't sensible to cry, anyway. It made your head buzzy, and your throat ache. Also, afterward, it made you hungry. Kirk decided that it was unwise to do anything at this particular moment which would make him hungry. Then he remembered the hardtack which Ken kept in the bow locker to refresh himself with during trips. Kirk fumbled for the button of the locker, and found it and the hardtack. He counted them; there were six. He put five of them back and nibbled the other carefully, to make it last as long as possible.

The air was more chill, now. Kirk decided that it must be night, though he didn't feel sleepy. He crawled under the tarpaulin which Ken kept to cover the trunks in foul weather. In doing so, he bumped against the engine. There was another maddening thing! A good, competent engine, sitting complacently in the middle of the boat, and he not able to start it! But even if he had known how to run it, he reflected that he couldn't steer the boat. So he lay still under the tarpaulin, which was dry, as well as warm, and tried to think of all sorts of pleasant things. Felicia had told him, when she gave him the green sweater on his birthday, that a hug and kiss were knit in with each stitch of it, and that when he wore it he must think of her love holding him close. It held him close now; he could feel the smooth soft loop of her hair as she bent down to say good-night; he could hear her sing, "Do-do, p'tit frÈre."

That was a good idea--to sing! He clasped his hands nonchalantly behind his head, and began the first thing that came to his mind:

But he did not finish. For the wind's voice was stronger, and the waves drowned the little tune, so lonely there in the midst of the empty water. Kirk cried himself to sleep, after all.

He could not even tell when the night gave way to cold day-break, for the fog cloaked everything from the sun's waking warmth. It might have been a week or a month that he had drifted on in the Flying Dutchman--it certainly seemed as long as a month. But he had eaten only two biscuits and was not yet starved, so he knew that it could not be even so much as a week. But he did not try to sing now. He was too cold, and he was very thirsty. He crouched under the tarpaulin, and presently he ate another hardtack biscuit. He could not hear the lighthouse fog-signal at all, now, and the waves were much bigger under the boat. They lifted her up, swung her motionless for a moment, and then let her slide giddily into the trough of another sea. "Even if I reached a desert island," Kirk thought mournfully, "I don't know what I'd do. People catch turkles and shoot at parrots and things, but they can see what they're doing."

The boat rolled on, and Kirk began to feel quite wretchedly sick, and thirstier than ever. He lay flat under the tarpaulin and tried to count minutes. Sixty, quite fast--that was one minute. Had he counted two minutes, now, or was it three? Then he found himself counting on and on--a hundred and fifty-one, a hundred and fifty-two.

"I wish I'd hurry up and die," said poor Kirk out loud.

Then his darkness grew more dark, for he could no longer think straight. There was nothing but long swirling waves of dizziness and a rushing sound.

"Phil," Kirk tried to say. "Mother."

At about this time, Ken was standing in the government wireless station, a good many miles from Asquam. He had besieged an astonished young operator early in the morning, and had implored him to call every ship at sea within reach. Now, in the afternoon, he was back again, to find out whether any replies had come.

"No boat sighted," all the hurrying steamers had replied. "Fog down heavy. Will keep look-out."

Ken had really given up all hope, long before. Yet--could he ever give up hope, so long as life lasted? Such strange things had happened--Most of all, he could not let Phil give up. Yet he knew that he could not keep on with this pace much longer--no sleep, and virtually no food. But then, if he gave up the search, if he left a single thing undone while there was still a chance, could he ever bear himself again? He sat in a chair at the wireless station, looking dully at the jumping blue spark.

"Keep on with it, please," he said. "I'm going out in a boat again."

"The fog's lifting, I think," said the operator.

"Oh, thank the Lord!" groaned Ken. "It was that--the not being able to see."

Yes--Kirk had felt that, too.

At Applegate Farm, Felicia wandered from room to room like a shadow, mechanically doing little tasks that lay to her hand. She was alone in her distress; they had not yet told the Maestro of this disaster, for they knew he would share their grief. Felicia caught the sound of a faint jingling from without, and moved slowly to the gate, where Mr. Hobart was putting the mail into the box. She opened her mother's letter listlessly as she walked back to the house, and sat down upon the door-step to read it--perhaps it would take her mind for a moment, this odd, unconscious letter, addressed even to a house which no longer sheltered them. But the letter smote her with new terror.

"Oh, if you only knew, my dear, dear chicks, what it will be to escape this kindly imprisonment--what it will mean to see you all again! I can hardly wait to come up the dear old familiar path to 24 Westover Street and hug you all--I'll hug Ken, even if he hates it, and Kirk, my most precious baby! They tell me I must be very careful still, but I know that the sight of you will be all that I need for the finishing remedy. So expect me, then, by the 12.05 on Wednesday, and good-by till then, my own dears."

Felicia sat on the door-stone, transfixed. Her mother coming home, on Wednesday--so much sooner than they had expected! She did not even know of the new house; and if she were to come to a home without Kirk--if there were never to be Kirk! Almost a week remained before Wednesday; how could she be put off? What if the week went by without hope; no hope, ever? Felicia sat there for hours, till the sun of late afternoon broke through the fog at last, and the mellow fields began one by one to reappear, reaching into the hazy distance. Felicia rose and went slowly into the house. On top of the organ lay the book of stories and poems she had written out in Braille for Kirk. It lay open, as he had left it, and she glanced at the page.

Felicia gave up the struggle with her grief. Leaving the door of Applegate Farm wide, she fled blindly to the Maestro. He was playing to himself and smiling when she crept into the library, but he stopped instantly when he saw her face. Before she could help herself, she had told him everything, thrust her mother's letter into his hand, and then gave way to the tears she had fought so long. The Maestro made no sign nor motion. His lips tightened, and his eyes blazed suddenly, but that was all.

He was all solicitude for Felicia. She must not think of going back to the empty farm-house. He arranged a most comfortable little supper beside the fire, and even made her smile, with his eager talk, all ringing with hope and encouragement. And finally he put her in charge of his sympathetic little housekeeper, who tucked her up in a great, dark, soft bed.

Left alone in the library, the Maestro paced unsteadily up and down. "It is the sea that takes them!" he whispered. "It took my son; now it has taken one whom I loved as my son."

He sank down upon the piano-stool and gazed at the sheet of music on the music-rack. It was Kirk's last exercise, written out carefully in the embossed type that the Maestro had been at such pains to learn and teach. Something like a sob shook the old musician. He raised clenched, trembling fists above his head, and brought them down, a shattering blow, upon the keyboard. Then he sat still, his face buried in his arms on the shaken piano. Felicia, lying stiff and wide-eyed in the great bed above, heard the crash of the hideous discord, and shuddered. She had been trying to remember the stately, comforting words of the prayer for those in peril on the sea, but now, frightened, she buried her face in the pillow.

"Oh, dear God," she faltered. "You--You must bring him back--You must!"