Two battle-lanterns lit the after 'tweendecks. There was a great heap of staved in casks, slopping about in an inch or two of water, all along that side, thrown there by the smash. I could hear the men yelling on deck. Captain Barlow was swearing in loud shouts. I could hear all this in the lull of the squall. I heard more than that, as I stood listening. I heard the faint crying out of a woman's voice from the steward's pantry (next door to the captain's cabin) on the opposite side, across the steep, tipped up slippery decks. At first I thought it must be the poor cat; but as the wind passed, letting me hear more clearly, I recognized that it was a woman's voice, crying out there in the darkness with a note of pain. I did not think of Aurelia. She never entered my head. All that I thought was “Poor creature! What a place for a woman!” The ship was jerking, you might almost call it gasping, as the seas struck her; it was no easy job to climb along that roof-slope of the deck with nothing to hold on by. I got across somehow, partly by luck, partly by fingernails. I even managed to open the pantry door, which was another difficulty, as it opened inwards, into the cabin. As I opened it, a suck of wind blew out my light. There I was in the dark, with a hurt woman, in a ship which for all I knew, might sink with all hands in twenty seconds. It is queer; I didn't mind the ship sinking. What I disliked was being in the dark with an unknown somebody who whimpered. “Are you much hurt?” I asked. “Hold on a minute. I'll strike a light.” I shut myself into the cabin, so as to keep out the draught. My feet kicked among the steward's crockery. It was as dark in that cubby-hole as in a grave. The unknown person, probably fearing me, thinking me some rough drunken sailor, was crying out now more in terror than in pain. She was begging me not to hurt her. I probably frightened her a good deal by not replying. The tinder box took up all my attention for a good couple of minutes. A tinder box is not a thing to get light by hurriedly. You try some day, to see how quickly you can light a candle by one. When I got the candle lit, I thought of the battle-lanterns swinging outside all the time. I might have saved myself all that trouble by using a little common sense. Well. Wait till you stand as I stood, with your heart in your boots, down in a pit of death, you'll see how much common sense will remain in your fine brains.