With the vaguest knowledge of what was
actually said, she suspected that San Benavides had opposed the very
project which, according to the President, he favored. She had caught
the name of the relief vessel, the words _bote_, "boat," _las doce_,
"twelve o'clock," _a bordo de buque_, "on board the ship," and others
which did not figure in the translation. She wondered why.
The long day wore slowly. The heat was intense. Even the hardened
sailors soon found that if the atmosphere of the cavern were to remain
endurable they might not smoke. So pipes were extinguished, and they
tried to better their condition. Water-soaked coats and boots placed
in the sun were dry in a few minutes. Iris was persuaded to allow her
dress to be treated in this manner. She was still wearing the heavy
ulster of the early morning--when the aftermath of the gale was chill
and searching--and the possession of this outer wrap made easy the
temporary discarding of a skirt and blouse.
Unhappily, she answered in French some simple query of the dapper
officer's. Thenceforth, to her great bewilderment and Hozier's
manifest annoyance, he pestered her with compliments and inquiries. To
avoid both, she expressed a longing for sleep. It seemed to her
excited imagination that she would never be able to sleep again, yet
her limbs were scarcely composed in comfort on a litter of coarse grass
and parched seaweed than her eyes closed in the drowsiness of sheer
exhaustion.
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