"It's the Dornröschen," Fritz announced. "Bound for Hamburg. Thirty-one days out from Montevideo."
In a few moments the ship had passed. Paul's eyes regretfully followed her. Hamburg, where his father had got Aunt Verona's piano! "The Sleeping Beauty," with twenty-five or thirty men aboard—another little floating world—like the Clytemnestra a living thing, losing herself in the softly encroaching gloom! It was beautiful; his throat ached and his eyes smarted from the sheer loveliness of the experience.
The last hint of colour had gone. Night closed in and all that could be seen of the strange ship was a pin-point of light at the stern. She had vanished as quietly as a dream. The presence of another ship on this lonely ocean revived, for a moment, his old fear of the dark.
He walked slowly aft. The concert had been half-heartedly resumed, although the second mate's watch was preparing to turn in. As heard from the after quarters, the music had a haunting appeal. Distance lent enchantment to the harsh accordions.
Bei uns da geht's immer also.
The little tune was vulgar but somehow fitting. It was even beautiful, rendered so by the homely cravings it satisfied. Just such a tune had come across the water from the mysterious Dornröschen. And there were still many weeks of isolation before the cape could be rounded and the coast of Western Australia sighted.
He wondered if there were some lad on that other ship—cabin-boy or apprentice—who had also been impressed by the beauty of the encounter, or had the old Clytemnestra, with her three masts and her daubs of red lead,
