There came a break-up however.  Supper was declared to be ready; and though nobody but Winthrop attended the skipper’s table, Elizabeth was obliged to take some refreshments of her own, along with a cup of the sloop’s tea, which most certainly she would have taken from no hand but the one that presented it to her.  And after it, Elizabeth was so strongly advised to go to the cabin and take some rest, that she could not help going; resting, she had no thought of.  Her companions were of easier mind; for they soon addressed themselves to such sleeping conveniencies as the little cabin could boast.  Miss Haye watched them begin and end their preparations and bestow themselves in resting positions to sleep; and then drawing a breath of comparative rest herself, she placed herself just within the cabin threshold, on the floor, where she could look out and have a good view of the deck through the partly open door.

It was this night as on the former occasion, a brilliant moonlight; and the vessel had no lamps up to hinder its power.  The mast and sails and lines stood out in sharp light and shadow.  The man at the helm Elizabeth could not see; the moonlight poured down upon Winthrop, walking slowly back and forth on the deck, his face and figure at every turn given fully and clearly to view.  Elizabeth herself was in shadow; he could not look within the cabin door and see her; she could look out and see him right well, and she did.  He was pacing slowly up and down, with a thoughtful face, but so calm in its thoughtfulness that it was a grievous contrast to Elizabeth’s own troubled and tossed nature.  It was all the more fascinating to her gaze; while it was bitter to her admiration.  The firm quiet tread, —­ the manly grave repose of the face, —­ spoke of somewhat in the character and life so unlike what she knew in her own, and so beautiful to her sense of just and right, that she looked in a maze of admiration and self-condemning; rating herself lower and lower and Winthrop higher and higher, at every fair view the moonlight gave, at every turn that brought him near or took him further from her.  And tears —­ curious tears —­ that came from some very deep wells of her nature, blinded her eyes, and rolled hot down her cheeks, and were wiped away that she might look.  “What shall I do when he gets tired of that walk and goes somewhere else?” —­ she thought; and with the thought, as instantly, Elizabeth gathered herself up from off the floor, wiped her cheeks from the tears, and stepped out into the moonlight.  “I can’t say anything, but I suppose he will,” was her meditation.  “Nobody knows when I shall have another chance.” —­

“They could not make it comfortable for you in there?” said Winthrop coming up to her.

“I don’t know —­ yes, —­ I have not tried.”

“Are you very much fatigued?”

“I suppose so. —­ I don’t feel it.”

“Can I do anything for you?”

The real answer nearly burst Elizabeth’s bounds of self-control, but nevertheless her words were quietly given.