Unconsciously, Brander was ranked now and then in her thoughts beside her husband, Noll Wing; she compared the two men without willing to make the comparison. And in the process, she studied Noll Wing more closely than she had ever studied him before. It was at this time that she first marked the fact that Noll was shrinking, wasting the flesh from his bones. His skin was becoming loose; it sagged. His great chest was drawing in between his shoulders; his shoulders slumped forward. Also Faith saw, without understanding, that the great cords of his neck were beginning to stand out under the loose skin, that hollows were forming about them. The man's bull neck was melting away.... Faith saw, though she did not fully understand; she knew that Noll was aging, nothing more.... She was drawn to Noll, at this discovery, by a vast tenderness; but this tenderness was impersonal. She thought it a recrudescence of her old, strong love for the man; it was in fact only such a feeling as she might have had for a sick or wounded beast. She pitied Noll profoundly; she tried to make him happy, and comfortable. She sought, now and then, to woo him to cheerfulness and mirth; but Noll was shrinking, day by day, into a more confirmed habit of complaint; he whined constantly, where in the old days he would have stormed and commanded. And he resented Faith's attentions, resented her very presence about him. One day she went herself into the galley and prepared a dish she thought would please him; when she told him what she had done, he exclaimed: "God's sake, Faith, quit fussing over me. I got along more'n twenty year without a woman...." Faith would not let herself feel the hurt of this.... But even while she watched over Noll, Brander more and more possessed her thoughts. Her recognition of this fact led her to be the more attentive to Noll, as though to recompense him for the thing he was losing.... She had never so poured out herself upon him. It was inevitable that this developing change in Faith should be marked by those in the cabin. Dan'l saw it, and Brander saw it.... Brander saw it, and at first his pulse leaped and pounded and his eyes shone with his thoughts.... On deck, about his duties, he carried the memory of her eyes always with him. Her eyes as she had looked at him, that day, and many days before. Questioning, a little wistful.... A little wondering....