“Is the old steamboat there yet?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at the murky swirls of the swift current. There was now no sign of the sand-bar on which the ill-fated craft had stranded. The foaming waves raced past and submerged its whole extent. None might know where it lay. A deep-water craft, drawing many feet, might have unwittingly plied above its expanse. Only a fraction of the superstructure of the steamboat--the pilot-house and texas, and the upper part of the cabin, showed above the waste of waters to distinguish the spot where the steamer had run aground and the pitiless storm had flayed out all its future utility. “The wreckers have been down time and again,” she went on with a note of apology. “They tuk off all the vallybles before the water riz,--the kyarpets, an’ funnicher, an’ mirrors, an’ sech--even the big chimbleys. The water got the rest, but wunst in a while ef us pore folks wants somethin’ that be lef’ fur lost--like some henges, or somthin’ we jest tries to supply ourse’fs ez bes’ we kin.” Adrian was still silently looking at the wreck that he had such cause to remember, with all that had since come and gone. “Well, I reckon Dad is over there now, hunting fur them henges,” said the woman, speculatively. “Leastwise,” holding her palm above her eyes, “’pears like I kin see a boat on the tother side, a-bobbin at the e-end of a painter!” Adrian moved with a sudden resolution. The oars smote the water, and with curt and formal thanks for the information, he began to row strongly across the current that despite his best endeavors carried him continually down and down the river, and required him to shape his course diagonally athwart the stream to counteract its impetus. The woman stood for a time aimlessly watching him, as the rhythmic oars plied, and the skiff, shadowless this dull day, kept on its way. At last she turned within and shut the door. CHAPTER XXIV The effect on Floyd-Rosney of his wife’s legal proceedings was deep and radical. His counsel constantly noted in him a sort of stunned surprise, as if contemplating some fantastic revulsion of the natural course of events. He had fashioned this result as definitely as if he had planned its every detail, yet he regarded it with an affronted amazement that he should be called upon to experience events so untoward. He had a disposition to belittle the efficiency of the demonstration. He perceived with a snort of rage and contempt the seriousness with which his counsel regarded it and declared violently that she could never get a decree. “You mean to defend the suit, then?” Mr. Stacey asked, very cool, and pallid, and dispassionate. “What else?” thundered Floyd-Rosney, the veins in his forehead blue and swollen, his face scarlet, his hands quivering. “I can’t see upon what grounds, in view of the terms of _retraxit_.” “_You_ dictated the terms of that precious performance,” declared Floyd-Rosney, with vindictive pleasure in shifting the blame.