Adventure stories; Islands -- Fiction; Love stories; Shipwrecks -- Fiction
Upon one of the smaller stones, well up the slope, sat the figure of the
woman he had drugged from the sea and whom he had hated with his last
conscious breath. Her head was lying against the sheer wall that ran up
alongside, and he could tell that she was staring out toward the sea,
which roared against the rocks so close by that the spray must have
reached her feet. The distance to this rock was fully three hundred
yards. There was a fascination about her loneliness that held him
immovable for a long time. Finally he struggled to a sitting posture,
faint and dizzy. At the same moment she slowly turned her head and
looked in his direction. Half rising, she made a movement as if to come
toward him, first peering intently. Then she sank back upon the rock and
sent her gaze out to the sea again.
With all the haste he could command he scrambled eagerly toward the
rocks, carrying the crumpled jacket in his hand. Not once did she take
her eyes from the breakers. Tired and faint, he at last came to the edge
of the rocky pile. Here his strength failed him and he sank trembling
with exhaustion upon the first friendly stone, still a hundred feet from
where she sat. In his bitter rage against her he strove to shout, but
the effort was little more than a hoarse whisper. Lying there
impotently, he studied her attitude as the minutes crept by, and there
came at last into his heart a touch of pity that swelled with the
sight of her.
Pain-racked but determined, he again started toward the elevation,
crawling over and around the boulders that intervened. He was within
five feet of her before he spoke, and then not until he had studied her
face for some moments, steadying himself against a large rock. She was
more beautiful than ever with her black hair awry and matted, brushed
away from the pure white face and fastened recklessly with the shell
combs she had worn on board the _Tempest Queen_. Her blue eyes looked
mournfully from beneath their long lashes. The slender white hands lay
listlessly in the lap of the once white dress, now water-stained,
wrinkled and shapeless. In spite of all that dreadful buffeting by the
wind and water she was still the beautiful creation of nature he had
found so charming in a realm where nature seldom presents herself.
"Lady Tennys," he called hoarsely. "You do not know how I thank God you
are alive."
She turned slowly, as if she had known all along of his tortuous
approach. Her voice was low and thrilling.
[Illustration: "'LADY TENNYS, ... YOU DO NOT KNOW HOW I THANK GOD YOU
ARE ALIVE'"]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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