I broke into it, too, (hardly knowing that the well of my
native speech was still there until I began to tap it), and we talked of
Tommy the Mate and his "starboard eye," called each other "bogh mulish,"
said things were "middling," spoke of the "threes" (trees) and the
"tunder" (thunder), and remembered that "our Big Woman was a wicked
devil and we wouldn't trust but she'd burn in hell."
How we laughed! We laughed at everything; we laughed at nothing; we
laughed until we cried; but I have often thought since that this was
partly because we knew in our secret hearts that we were always hovering
on the edge of tragic things.
Martin never once mentioned my husband or my marriage, or his letters to
my father, the Bishop and Father Dan, which had turned out so terribly
true; but we had our serious moments for all that, and one of them was
when we were bending over a large chart which he had spread out on the
table to show me the course of the ship through the Great Unknown,
leaning shoulder to shoulder, so close that our heads almost touched,
and I could see myself in his eyes as he turned to speak to me.
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