At the close of each day's diary,
the same dismal silence followed. When at last he finished his tale and
sprung the indelicate surprise which is wont to fetch a crash of
laughter, not a ripple of sound resulted. It was as if the tale had been
told to dead men. After what seemed a long, long time, somebody sighed,
somebody else stirred in his seat; presently, the men dropped into a low
murmur of confidential talk, each with his neighbor, and the incident was
closed. There were indications that that man was fond of his anecdote;
that it was his pet, his standby, his shot that never missed, his
reputation-maker. But he will never tell it again. No doubt he will
think of it sometimes, for that cannot well be helped; and then he will
see a picture, and always the same picture--the double rank of dead men;
the vacant deck stretching away in dimming perspective beyond them, the
wide desert of smooth sea all abroad; the rim of the moon spying from
behind a rag of black cloud; the remote top of the mizzenmast shearing a
zigzag path through the fields of stars in the deeps of space; and this
soft picture will remind him of the time that he sat in the midst of it
and told his poor little tale and felt so lonesome when he got through.
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