IN THE NEW GRAY DAWN My anxious glance wandered from the face I so dearly loved, out where those dark restless waters merged into the brooding mystery of the black night.

How unspeakably dreary, lonely, hopeless it all was! Into what tragic unknown fate had this earliest comrade of my manhood been remorselessly swept?
Was all indeed well with him?
or had the Nemesis of a wrong once done dealt its fatal stroke at last?
The voices of the night were silent; the chambers of the great tossing sea hid their secret well.

Had this gallant and reckless young soldier of France, this petted courtier of the gayest court in Europe, whose very name and rank I knew not, succeeded in his desperate deed?
Had he reached yonder blood-stained shore, lined with infuriated savages, and found safe passage through them to the side of the woman he had once called wife, and then forgotten?
Or had he found, instead, the solemn peace of death, amid the swirling waters of this vast inland sea, so many leagues to the westward of that sunny land he loved?
These were the thoughts that shook me, as I leaned out above the rail, her dear hand always on my shoulder.

Never have the circling years found voice, nor the redeemed wilderness made answer.
"Possibly it might be done," I admitted slowly.

"'T is scarce farther than I swam just now, and he is neither weary nor wounded." We all realised it was a useless peril to remain there longer, and I sat at the helm and watched, while Burns, who developed considerable knowledge in such matters, fitted the heavy sail in place.