Natalie refused to leave the deck. I lashed her securely beside me. Together we awaited the end. When the roar of the following wave came close, so close that the voices of the officers of the ship could be no longer heard, Natalie spoke. The hollow sound was no longer in her voice. Her own soft sweet tones had come back. "Arthur," she asked, "is this the end?" "I fear it is," I answered, speaking close to her ear so that she might hear. "Then we have little time, and I have something which I must say, which you must promise me to remember when--when--I am no longer with you." "You will be always with me while we live. I think I deserve that at last." "Yes, you deserve that and more. I will be with you while I live, but that will not be for long." I was about to interrupt her when she put her soft little hand upon my lips and said: "Listen, there is very little time. It is all a mistake. I mean Herbert was wrong. He might as well have let me have my earthly span of happiness or folly--call it what you will." "You see that now--thank God!" "Yes, but I see it too late, I did not know it until--until I was dead. Hush!" Again I tried to interrupt her, for I thought her mind was wandering. "I died psychically with Herbert. That was when we first saw the light on the island. Since then I have lived mechanically, but it has only been life in so low a form that I do not now know what has happened between that time and this. And I could not now speak as I am speaking save by a will power which is costing me very dear. But it is the only voice you could hear. I do not therefore count the cost. My brother's brain so far overmatched my own that it first absorbed and finally destroyed my mental vitality. This influence removed, I am a rudderless ship at sea--bound to perish." "May his torments endure for ever. May the nethermost pit of hell receive him!" I said with a groan of agony. But Natalie said: "Hush! I might have lingered on a little longer, but I chose to concentrate the vital force which would have lasted me a few more senile years into the minutes necessary for this message from me to you--a message I could not have given you if he were not dead. And I am dying so that you may hear it. Dying! My God! I am already dead." She seemed to struggle against some force that battled with her, and the roar of many waters was louder around us before she was able to speak again. "Bend lower, Arthur; my strength is failing, and I have not yet said that for which I am here. Lower still.