“You’re a very cheerful man, aren’t you,” Anna-Rose said, as he pushed them out of the cabin and along the corridor, holding up Anna-Felicitas on her feet, who seemed quite unable to run alone.

The steward didn’t answer, but caught hold of Anna-Felicitas at the foot of the stairs and carried her up them, and then having got her on deck propped her in a corner near the life-boat allotted to the set of cabins they were in, and darted away and in a minute was back again with a big coat which he wrapped round her.

“May as well be comfortable till you do begin to drown,” he said briskly, “but mind you don’t forget to throw it off, Missie, the minute you feel the water.”

Anna-Felicitas slid down on to the deck, her head leaning against the wall, her eyes shut, a picture of complete indifference to whatever might be going to happen next.  Her face was now as white as the frill of the night-gown that straggled out from beneath her coat, for the journey from the cabin to the deck had altogether finished her.  Anna-Rose was thankful that she felt too ill to be afraid.  Her own heart was black with despair,—­despair that Anna-Felicitas, the dear and beautiful one, should presently, at any moment, be thrown into that awful heaving water, and certainly be hurt and frightened before she was choked out of life.

She sat down beside her, getting as close as possible to keep her warm.  Her own twin.  Her own beloved twin.  She took her cold hands and put them away beneath the coat the steward had brought.  She slid an arm round her and laid her cheek against her sleeve, so that she should know somebody was there, somebody who loved her.  “What’s the good of it all—­why were we born—­” she wondered, staring at the hideous gray waves as they swept up into sight over the side of the ship and away again as the ship rose up, and at the wet deck and the torn sky, and the miserable-looking passengers in their life-jackets collected together round the life-boat.

Nobody said anything except the German ladies.  They, indeed, kept up a constant wail.  The others were silent, the men mostly smoking cigarettes, the women holding their fluttering wraps about them, all of them staring out to sea, watching for the track of the torpedo to appear.  One shot had been fired already and had missed.  The ship was zig-zagging under every ounce of steam she could lay on.  An official stood by the life-boat, which was ready with water in it and provisions.  That the submarine must be mad, as the official remarked, to fire on an American ship, didn’t console anybody, and his further assurance that the matter would not be allowed to rest there left them cold.  They felt too sure that in all probability they themselves were going to rest there, down underneath that repulsive icy water, after a struggle that was going to be unpleasant.

The man who had roused Anna-Rose’s indignation as the ship left the landing-stage by looking as though he were soon going to be sorry for her, came across from the first class, where his life-boat was, to watch for the track of the expected torpedo, and caught sight of the twins huddled in their corner.