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London, Jack

"The Sea-Wolf"

In teaching her I learned quite a deal myself, though I was applying the knowledge already acquired by sailing the Ghost and by watching the boat-steerers sail the small boats. She was an apt pupil, and soon learned to keep the course, to luff in the puffs, and to cast off the sheet in an emergency.


? ? ? ? Having grown tired, apparently, of the task, she relinquished the oar to me. I had folded up the blankets, but she now proceeded to spread them out on the bottom. When all was arranged snugly, she said:


? ? ? ? 'Now, sir, to bed. And you shall sleep until luncheon.'


? ? ? ? 'Till dinnertime,' she corrected, remembering the arrangement on the Ghost.


? ? ? ? What could I do? She insisted and said, 'Please, please'; whereupon I turned the oar over to her and obeyed. I experienced a positive sensuous delight as I crawled into the bed she had made with her hands. The calm and control which were so much a part of her seemed to have been communicated to the blankets, so that I was aware of a soft dreaminess and content, and of an oval face and brown eyes framed in a fisherman's cap and tossing against a background now of gray cloud, now of gray sea, and then I was aware that I had been asleep.


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