_It_ was but one. I counted twenty coming and going amid the shadows of the squalls and flying masses of fog. You would have supposed that a fleet somewhere hidden were firing great guns, so thunderous was the splintering of those bergs majestically rocking their mighty masses. The nearest--that on the starboard bow--was about a mile off. Others showed to port and astern: one heap, like an island, darkened the haze on the port bow. The gale had apparently broken up the barrier and we were in the thick of the floating bodies.
Miss Otway came to the foot of the companion steps and waited for me to make way for her. I stepped out and she ascended the steps and looked round the sea, but in silence. Her face was hardened into stone by despair. Hours of suspense and grief, hours spent in the most awful kind of loneliness the imagination can figure, with the darkness of the spirit of death for ever upon her heart, had done their work with the poor young lady: sensation was dumb.
And now there was nothing to do but await the end, come what might. I let her stand a little, looking, then taking her by the arm, gently but firmly, conducted her below and seated her where she had lain during the night. I was resolved that my own despair should not be visible to her, and partly to cover myself, so to speak, and partly for the good of the thing, I boiled some coffee, and put food on the deck near the stove; but one looked at such a repast with the emotions of a malefactor to whom breakfast is served whilst the hangman waits.
Whilst I was at this work she addressed me calmly:
'There is no doubt, I suppose, that we shall strike the ice?'
'If it happens, shall we be better off down here than on deck?'
'If we are to strike the ice,' she said, 'I should wish to be drowned quickly. I would rather die at once than be thrown soaked on the ice to lie a little and freeze--it would take time--I fear the sufferings. I am not afraid of death, I wish it to be quick.'
'There's no ice nearer to us than a mile, that I can make out,' I said, then handed her a pannikin of coffee. 'Pray drink this.'
'If the hull strikes, will it go to pieces instantly?' she asked.
'Who can tell? She might beach herself and find us a home till the berg floated north, where the smoke of our fire will be seen.'