Soldiers of Fortune Part 29

Hope raised her eyes and looked up at him in silence, and had the man in the wheelhouse been watching the stars, as he should have been, no one but the two foolish young people on the bow of the boat would have known her answer.

The s.h.i.+p's bell sounded eight times, and Hope moved slightly.

"So late as that," she sighed. "Come. We must be going back."

A great wave struck the s.h.i.+p's side a friendly slap, and the wind caught up the spray and tossed it in their eyes, and blew a strand of her hair loose so that it fell across Clay's face, and they laughed happily together as she drew it back and he took her hand again to steady her progress across the slanting deck.

As they pa.s.sed hand in hand out of the shadow into the light from the wheelhouse, the lookout in the bow counted the strokes of the bell to himself, and then turned and shouted back his measured cry to the bridge above them. His voice seemed to be a part of the murmuring sea and the welcoming winds.

"Listen," said Clay.

"Eight bells," the voice sang from the darkness. "The for'ard light's s.h.i.+ning bright--and all's well."