Driven to Bay, Volume III by Florence Marryat

But of every one on board the _Pandora_ Godfrey Harland was in reality the most nervous and uncomfortable. He longed to be able to shut himself up in his own berth, and refuse sustenance, but he could not afford to do it. He felt it was indispensable for him to appear at meals, and pretend to have a good appetite, and to talk and laugh loudly, as he had been wont to do, but he was obliged to pay for it afterwards by drowning his thoughts and dulling his conscience with copious draughts of brandy. And notwithstanding all his efforts to appear jolly and at his ease, he could see that his fellow-passengers were not quite the same to him as they had been before. Although Will Farrell and Mr Fowler had kept their own counsel, hints _would_ leak out -- a word was dropped here and there, or a look given -- and Mr Harland's companions began to glance shyly at him. His jests were not responded to; his offers of assistance were rejected; and conversation was hushed as he drew near. Even Grace Vansittart seemed to avoid him, and drop her big brown eyes confusedly when they met his. Harland perceived the general feeling, though no one was brave enough to express it openly, and it drove him to drink. For two nights he drank to intoxication; and after some hours of torpid sleep he ascended the poop deck, where, with bleared eyes and flushed and feverish face, he leaned upon the taffrail. The nervous twitching of the fingers that clawed the buttons of his coat, his startled glances and trembling tongue, showed what havoc the drink had made with him. But the state of the weather was in his favour. Had not the thoughts of the ship's company been occupied with the fog and its possible danger, his conduct would have been far more noticeable than it was; but all minds were too much wrapped up in their own welfare to have time to concern themselves about the doings of others.

As Godfrey Harland left the saloon, little Winnie Leyton escaped from her mother's side, and, disobeying orders, clambered step by step up the ladder, and landed herself on the poop deck. Dodging the officer on watch, who happened to be Vernon Blythe (who, she knew well, would soon re-consign her to her mother's care), the mischievous little imp concealed her tiny person behind the mizenmast, waiting until the young sailor had turned his back, and then pattered aft along the wet deck to Harland's side. He hated children, and this one beyond others, because both her mother and sister had always displayed a marked aversion to him. So, to her innocent questions and remarks, he made no reply; and, tired of his silence, Winnie ran off to find a more congenial companion, and commenced to play ‘peep-bo! ' with the quarter-master on the lee side of the wheel-house, much to the amusement of that jolly tar. But children soon weary of any employment; so, after standing on the bench and shaking her arch little head, with its golden curls, at him through the window for the space of five minutes, she kissed the helmsman through the pane of glass, and jumped on the deck again.