Perhaps he ought to devote himself to the Countess, and thus effectually prevent any approaches that Claudius might meditate.
Yes--that was probably his duty.

He wished he might ask counsel of his sister; but then she did not know, and it seemed unfair, and altogether rather a betrayal of confidence or something--at all events, it was not right, and he would not do it.

Barker might be wrong too.

And so the poor Duke, muddle-headed and weary with this storm in his tea-cup, and with having his tea-cup come to grief in a real storm into the bargain, turned into his deck-cabin to "sleep on it," thinking the morning would bring counsel.
Claudius had many things to think of too; but he was weary, for he had slept little of late, and not at all the night before; so he lay down and went over the scenes of the evening; but soon he fell asleep, and dreamed of her all the night long.
But the good yacht _Streak_ held on her course bravely, quivering in the joy of her new-spread wings.

For what hulk is so dull and pitifully modern as not to feel how much gladder a thing it is to bound along with straining shrouds and singing sails and lifting keel to the fierce music of the wind than to be ever conscious of a burning sullenly-thudding power, put in her bosom by the unartistic beast, man, to make her grind her breathless way whither he would, and whither she would not?
Not the meanest mud-scow or harbour tug but would rather have a little mast and a bit of canvas in the fresh salt breeze than all the hundreds of land-born horse-powers and fire-driven cranks and rods that a haste-loving generation can cram into the belly of the poor craft.