Page:The Iron Pirate 1905.djvu/390

376 answered, and as she spoke there was a great sound of cheering above, and a great tramp of feet upon the deck; and as we hurried up, the hands I loved to see crowded about me, and their shouting was carried far over the water, and was taken up on other ships, which threw their searchlights upon us, so that the night was as a new day to me, and the awakening from the weeks of dreaming as the coming of spring after winter's dark. Yet, as the child-face was all lighted with radiant smiles, and honest hands clasped mine, and the waters echoed the triumphant greeting, I could not but think again of Captain Black, or ask myself—Is the man really dead, or shall we yet hear of him, bringing terror upon the sea, and death and suffering; the master of the nations, and the child of a wanton ambition? Or is his grave in the great Atlantic that he ruled in the mighty moments of his power?

Ah, I wonder.