Half mechanically, at last, she turned off the light and
lay back on her pillow where, in less time than it takes to tell it,
she was sound asleep. Still, however, the pirates of her book mingled
with her dreams, which were so horrible she struggled into
wakefulness--to find herself drenched with perspiration while shivering
with horror. Anxious for companionship to counteract the effect of
these evil visions, she reached out an arm to the other little bed and
whispered, "Faith!"
With a shock she discovered that the bed was smooth and empty; it had
not been occupied. At the same instant she became aware of whispering
voices just without the porthole above her bed, and a sentence or two
proved they were not English-speaking voices, either, but those of
orientals, of whom, as you know, there were many on shipboard. At
first she could not understand a word, they spoke so low and rapidly,
but presently she heard with clearness the sentence,
"But ee mus' be kill eef she do care! It can no be help, now."
Then more whispers, and then again, distinctly, one urging the other to
attend to the matter at once, the quicker the better, "foh eet gotta
be," and a word or two about the "Capitan Sahib," which she could not
catch.
But, in her abnormal, excited state, she had heard enough. Trembling
from the tragedies of sleep, she thought she had fallen into the
greater ones of reality. These men were going to kill somebody--and
"she" was to feel dreadfully about it.
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