'Oh, it goes higher than humanity, man, higher than humanity,' I interrupted.
'In finding out for yourself,' he continued, 'whether the hull's the wreck of the "Lady Emma," and whether the captain, and his wife, and your young lady are still aboard----'
'By heaven, yes, then!' I exclaimed; 'Only to think of her as _being_ on board, and perishing there for the want of my coming to her help! Whether she's there or not, Cliffe, it was the right thing to do, as you say, and even in that thought I find a sort of comfort. Shall you heave-to when it comes on dark?'
'I'm for shoving on, sir, but we'll take no risks.'
'None, though the job of heaving the land into view should fill another month.'
And still expectation and excitement so worked in me, I felt ill with the conflict. I was up and down ceaselessly till the dusk blackened the scene out. The cold drove me below, restlessness forced me above again. It was always the same picture, the rolling and plunging figure of the brig, gleaming with barbs, and spears, and motionless pennons of ice: the glare of her band of topsail dingy against the ice beyond as she swung it through the howling sweep of wind: the quick dazzle of froth recoiling in thunder from the thrust of the bows: the large grey swell coursed by the breaking surge, and to right and left, and ahead and astern, the shadows and clear shapes of ice, some with brows in the flying scud, some table-like and flashing like sunlight as the seas charged them and burst, one showing a hatchet-like edge till our rolling brig, opened it into a coast of marble that vanished in a haze of mist and spray.
Happily, after it had been dark about an hour, the brig still blowing forward under reefed topsail and foresail, whilst I sat in the cabin warming myself, drinking some hot brandy and water, but always with ears straining to catch a cry on deck, Cliffe came below, and gave me the good news of a shift of wind into the north-west, with a scanting of it, and a plenty of starlight, and the Southern Cross looking almost upright.
'Nothing,' he answered with a cheerful grimace. 'Except, that as the Southern Cross is upright at midnight on one day only in the year, the sight of it almost on end now is interesting.'