Both knew that at any moment the derelict might succumb to the forces striving to destroy her.  And, as they sat waiting, the realization came to both what a small part of the incidents of this heaving night the dismemberment of their washing vessel would be.  In the vortex of the riot, when the heavens and the ocean seemed united in the creation of chaos, they sensed the littleness of their own lives and the vanity of their affairs.

As a thunderous roar of wind smote the vessel Dan felt the pressure of Virginia’s hand on his shoulder suddenly tighten.  He turned to her, and through the darkness caught the vague outlines of her face, which was fixed on the faint blur which marked the forward part of the hulk.

His eyes followed just as her fingers loosened their grasp.  He saw nothing save the dull flash of swirling waters and the amorphous blotch of hull.  Slowly her hand tightened again; and then, as he looked he caught above the deck an impression of something moving.  It seemed to be something that was revealing itself to the instinct rather than to their visual senses.

As the wind passed on, leaving that confused murmur, broken only by the dogged rush of waters, Virginia spoke to Dan with trembling voice.

“What is it?”

Dan’s eyes were still staring forward.  He spoke through his clenched teeth.

“Wait a moment.”  More accustomed to the gloom ahead he was able to determine that the sail had torn from the boom and was waving out from the shattered mast-top like a flag.  The mast itself seemed to be reeling.  Was the hull opening and disintegrating?

Almost without volition he half arose to his feet.  The girl followed his action, still clinging to his shoulder.  Dan inclined his head to speak to her, when with a shriek the wind came again.  There was a dull crash forward, a splintering and rearing of wood, a quivering of the entire hull; and then, as though hurled by a giant hand, a huge section of wood, whether a part of cargo or hull Dan could not tell, shot out of the night, crashing a hole in the roof of the cabin behind which they were crouching, and then bounded over their heads into the sea.

Both remained still, as though carved in stone.  Forward there was a crashing sound, a series of blows, as though some great hammer were engaged in disintegrating the hull.  There was a grinding of wood against wood which caused the deck under their feet to tremble.  Still neither moved.  The terrible thought that the derelict was going to pieces was in both their minds.  They had no doubt of this now.  They simply waited.

Virginia had no great fear.  Her dominant thought was the dread of the first immersion in the cold, cruel, black waters.  But it would not last long.  Not long, not long—­these two words kept ringing in her mind.  Her shoulders were drawn up, as though preparing for the shock.

Dan had not moved.  Half crouching, half kneeling, his eyes were fastened upon the vague deck ahead.  Now, as though the elements had worked to give him sight, the black sky was suddenly seared by a long, lurid line of lightning.  It was but the fraction of a second; it was long enough.  In that blue glow the derelict took form, grim, ghostly, heaving, as a spirit picture might be thrown upon a black cloth, every detail limned in filmy perfection.