Part 8 (1/2)

”What shall we do? What shall we do?” moaned the freckled man, wriggling fantastically in his dead balloon.

The changing sh.o.r.e seemed to fascinate the tall man, and for a time he did not speak.

Suddenly he concluded his minuet of horror. He wheeled about and faced the freckled man. He elaborately folded his arms.

”So,” he said, in slow, formidable tones. ”So! This all comes from your accursed vanity, your bathing-suit, your idiocy; you have murdered your best friend.”

He turned away. His companion reeled as if stricken by an unexpected arm.

He stretched out his hands. ”Tom, Tom,” wailed he, beseechingly, ”don't be such a fool.”

The broad back of his friend was occupied by a contemptuous sneer.

Three s.h.i.+ps fell off the horizon. Landward, the hues were blending. The whistle of a locomotive sounded from an infinite distance as if tooting in heaven.

”Tom! Tom! My dear boy,” quavered the freckled man, ”don't speak that way to me.”

”Oh, no, of course not,” said the other, still facing away and throwing the words over his shoulder. ”You suppose I am going to accept all this calmly, don't you? Not make the slightest objection? Make no protest at all, hey?”

”Well, I--I----” began the freckled man.

The tall man's wrath suddenly exploded. ”You've abducted me! That's the whole amount of it! You've abducted me!”

”I ain't,” protested the freckled man. ”You must think I'm a fool.”

The tall man swore, and sitting down, dangled his legs angrily in the water. Natural law compelled his companion to occupy the other end of the raft.

Over the waters little shoals of fish spluttered, raising tiny tempests. Languid jelly-fish floated near, tremulously waving a thousand legs. A row of porpoises trundled along like a procession of cog-wheels. The sky became greyed save where over the land sunset colors were a.s.sembling.

The two voyagers, back to back and at either end of the raft, quarrelled at length.

”What did you want to follow me for?” demanded the freckled man in a voice of indignation.

”If your figure hadn't been so like a bottle, we wouldn't be here,”

replied the tall man.

CHAPTER III

The fires in the west blazed away, and solemnity spread over the sea.

Electric lights began to blink like eyes. Night menaced the voyagers with a dangerous darkness, and fear came to bind their souls together.

They huddled fraternally in the middle of the raft.

”I feel like a molecule,” said the freckled man in subdued tones.

”I'd give two dollars for a cigar,” muttered the tall man.

A V-shaped flock of ducks flew towards Barnegat, between the voyagers and a remnant of yellow sky. Shadows and winds came from the vanished eastern horizon.

”I think I hear voices,” said the freckled man.