“C. Q.”; or, In the Wireless House
around, still locked in a strangling embrace.
The water roared all about them and away up above, through the foam, he could see the stars whirling in spirals and Cloud still playing on the mandolin, then the “tove” released him and he worked his way through the dark currents for miles along the bottom of the ocean until he came groping through the coal chute of the vicarage, and found himself in the library, sitting at the desk with one of his uncles sermons in his hand, and the Captain’s steward was trying to take it away from him. singing, “Rocked in the craydul of ther deep, I lay me down in peace to sleep.”
Just then the sun rose and suffocated him, and he floated out through the vicarage garden until he lay in the broad noonday heat by the lilac arbor and became very, very happy and peaceful and sleepy—just like the song. There was a smell of violets all about him and Evelyn Farquhar came daintily across the lawn in a white frock with a big blue sash, smiling at him with parted lips and teasing eyes, and he kept his own shut and pretended not to see her. She came close and bent over him as he lay on the hot grass and touched his hair, and111
