"You come along o' me, marm," said the man, with a twinkle in his eye. "I'll pervide ye with a lifeboat, bless yer heart!" And in the dim light of the saloon stairhead lamp, Luke and Agatha were left facing each other. "Why did you not let me know you were coming?" he asked sharply. He looked round with haggard eyes; they were quite alone. "I had no time. We just caught the boat by an hour." She was singularly quiet. Both of them seemed to forget that every moment lost increased the danger of their position. "Why did you come?" he asked. She looked at him, and there was that in her eyes that makes men mad. "Because I could not stay away from you." His breath came sharply with a catch. For a few moments they forgot such things as life and death. They did more, they defied death; for surely such love as this is stronger than the mere end of life. Again it was the possibility of something good and something strong that lurked hidden behind the worldliness of Agatha Ingham-Baker, and Luke FitzHenry, of all men, alone had the power of bringing that possibility to the surface. All around them the wind moaned and shrieked through the rigging; the waves, beating against the sheer side of the doomed Croonah, filled the air with a sound of great foreboding--the deep voice of an elemental power that knows no mercy. Within twenty feet of them men and women were struggling like dumb and driven animals for bare life--struggling, shouting, quarrelling over a paltry precedence of a minute or so in going to the boats; within a hundred yards of them, out over the dark waters, Agatha's mother, thrown from an overturned boat, was struggling her last struggle, with her silly old face turned indignantly up to heaven. But they saw none of these things. All the good men were wanted for the boats, and the captain, with two officers only and a few stewards, defended the gangway against the rush of the panic-stricken native crew. "FitzHenry! FitzHenry!" the old captain shouted. "For God's sake, come here!" For Luke alone was dreaded by the lascars. But Luke and Agatha heeded nothing. These people, these lives, were nothing to them, for a passionate love is the acme of selfishness. They heard the sounds, however; they heard the captain calling for the man who had never failed him. "I wrecked her for you," said Luke, in Agatha's hungry ears. "I did it all for you."