"_You_ say that!" I exclaimed in acute anguish,--"_you_ say it--seeing me thus! I thought you were my friend!" He looked full at me, ... his eyes grew large and luminous with a splendour of scorn, passion and sorrow intermingled. "Did you?" and again the terrific smile lit up his pale features,--"You were mistaken! _I am your Enemy!_" A dreadful silence followed. Something lurid and unearthly in his expression appalled me, ... I trembled and grew cold with fear. Mechanically I replaced the pistol in its case,----then I gazed up at him with a vacant wonder and wild piteousness, seeing that his dark and frowning figure seemed to increase in stature, towering above me like the gigantic shadow of a storm-cloud! My blood froze with an unnameable sickening terror, ... then, thick darkness veiled my sight, and I dropped down senseless! XL Thunder and wild tumult,--the glare of lightning,--the shattering roar of great waves leaping mountains high and hissing asunder in mid-air,--to this fierce riot of savage elements let loose in a whirling boisterous dance of death, I woke at last with a convulsive shock. Staggering to my feet I stood in the black obscurity of my cabin, trying to rally my scattered forces,--the electric lamps were extinguished, and the lightning alone illumined the sepulchral darkness. Frantic shoutings echoed above me on deck,--fiend-like yells that sounded now like triumph, now like despair, and again like menace,--the yacht leaped to and fro like a hunted stag amid the furious billows, and every frightful crash of thunder threatened, as it seemed, to split her in twain. The wind howled like a devil in torment,--it screamed and moaned and sobbed as though endowed with a sentient body that suffered acutest agony,--anon it rushed downwards with an angry swoop as of wide-flapping wings, and at each raging gust I thought the vessel must surely founder. Forgetting everything but immediate personal danger, I tried to open my door. It was locked outside!--I was a prisoner! My indignation at this discovery exceeded every other feeling, and beating with both hands on the wooden panels, I called, I shouted, I threatened, I swore,----all in vain! Thrown down twice by the topsy-turvey lurching of the yacht, I still kept up a desperate hammering and calling, striving to raise my voice above the distracting pandemonium of noise that seemed to possess the ship from end to end, but all to no purpose,--and finally, hoarse and exhausted, I stopped and leaned against the unyielding door to recover breath and strength. The storm appeared to be increasing in force and clamour,--the lightning was well-nigh incessant, and the clattering thunder followed each flash so instantaneously as to leave no doubt but that it was immediately above us. I listened,--and presently heard a frenzied cry--