The last day of April came, and with it a buffeting wind. Slowly the grey sky darkened towards evening. I made a frantic appeal to my jailer to take me to the captain, but the surly fellow glanced darkly at me without a word. I clutched him as he left the cabin, but he put out a great foot and sent me staggering across the floor to jolt against the partition and collapse half-winded. There seemed no hope. In the evening an angry sun broke from the clouds and set full ahead. Languidly I told myself we were steering west. Then I threw myself across the floor, and with my face in my hands gave way to a fit of inconsolable weeping. CHAPTER XX AT THE DAWN OF A SUMMER'S DAY It was still dark when I awoke to feel rough hands about me, and the tightening grip of ropes around my arms and legs. I shouted, and a huge hand was promptly clapped across my mouth, and a moment later a suffocating gag, knotted mercilessly at the back of my neck, stifled the least groan. A bandage, too, was fastened over my eyes. I made one convulsive effort to burst the bonds which were rapidly netting me about, but with the only result that they were twisted the more cruelly, crushing me in as though by the embrace of some enormous bear, till I thought my ribs would crack beneath the strain. The agony was almost unendurable, and was made still worse by the gag over my mouth; for it would have been some relief to have been able to rage and curse and scream. But not a sound could I utter. It seemed as though a terrible explosive force were being compressed within me, unable to burst free. And then a sacking of some kind was drawn over my head, and the mouldy reek of it made me want to vomit; and though suffocating for lack of air it was even worse agony to breathe the foul fumes that came through the filthy stuff about my face. A spasm convulsed my whole body from within, but the cords around me were too tight to allow so much as a tremble to shake my limbs; and then I felt suddenly limp and made no struggle, but yielded to the inevitable without a question or a hope. Something was about to happen at last. Perhaps I was to be thrown into the sea. Well, life's whole treatment of me had been so unjust, so spiteful, and during the last two weeks so cruel and intolerable, that any sort of end would be a relief. So I gave no heed to the bumpings and shakings I had to undergo. I didn't ask myself what was happening to me. And lying calmly so I was probably happier than questioning and struggling. It was impossible for me to stir a finger to help myself. I simply didn't care what became of me. I think I even fell into swooning sleep, so indifferent was I to my fate. For I was tired out with my captivity, first at Rancey Bridge and then in this vessel, and my spirit was broken.