Anything was explicable in the light of panic. She gathered up a skirt
and some blouses, locked the dressing-case, put the key in her purse,
and quitted the room with a heavy heart, for the handling of her
friend's treasures had brought sad memories.
Passing into the deck corridor, she heard the captain's voice,
apparently at a considerable distance. Two hundred yards away from the
ship, Courtenay and Tollemache were anchoring a flat framework, built
of spare hatches and secured by wooden cross-pieces. On it stood the
first of the infernal machines. The raft floated level with the water,
so its only conspicuous fitting was a small spar and a block, to which
a line and an iron bar were attached. The men looked strange in her
eyes at that distance. In the marvellously clear light she could see
their features distinctly, and, when Courtenay shouted to a sailor to
haul in the slack of the line, she caught a trumpet-like ring that
recalled the scene in the saloon when he held back the mob of stewards.
His athletic figure, silhouetted against the shimmering green of the
water, was instinct with graceful strength.
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