‘But do you think they will ever see us, with this fog, and no moon, no moon at all?’
‘They may find it a little difficult, though it is amazing how something that floats shows up on the night sea, when you are looking for it. In any case I shall hail every so often, like a minute gun, to help them. But, you know, it would be no very great harm, were we to have to wait until day. The water is as warm as milk, there is no kind of a sea apart from the swell, and if you stretch out your arms, stick out your belly and throw your head back till your ears are awash you will find you float as easy as kiss my hand.’
The minute-gun hails succeeded one another in a long, long series; Stephen floated easy; and they drifted westwards on the equatorial current, westwards and probably a little north. Jack reflected upon the relativity of motion, upon the difficulty of measuring the speed or set of a current if your ship is moving with it and you can neither anchor nor observe any fixed point of land; and he wondered how Mowett would set about searching once the alarm was raised. If the observations were conscientiously made and the log accurately heaved, read and recorded, then it would not be very hard for him to run back close-hauled or even with the wind one point free, always provided that the breeze remained steady at south-east by south and that his estimate of the current was correct: each degree of error in that would, in the course of an hour’s sailing at four and a half knots, amount to … In the midst of his calculations he became aware that Stephen, lying there as stiff as a board, was becoming distressed. ‘Stephen,’ he said, pushing him, for Stephen’s head was thrown back so far that he could not easily hear, ‘Stephen, turn over, put your arms round my neck, and we will swim for a little.’ Then as he felt Stephen’s feet on the back of his legs, ‘You have not kicked off your shoes. Do not you know you must kick off your shoes? What a fellow you are, Stephen.’
So they went on, sometimes swimming gently, sometimes floating in the luke-warm sea, rising and falling on the very long, regular swell. They did not talk much, though Stephen did observe that it was all very much easier, now that he was allowed to change position from time to time; even the act of floating came to him more naturally with use – ‘I believe I may set up as a Triton.’ And on another occasion he said, ‘I am very deeply indebted to you, Jack, for supporting me in this way.’