"This time"--he spoke aloud and through his
set teeth--"this time I'm going to end it!"
On the afternoon of the third day out, Alexander was sitting well to the
stern, on the windward side where the chairs were few, his rugs over
him and the collar of his fur-lined coat turned up about his ears. The
weather had so far been dark and raw. For two hours he had been
watching the low, dirty sky and the beating of the heavy rain upon
the iron-colored sea. There was a long, oily swell that made exercise
laborious. The decks smelled of damp woolens, and the air was so humid
that drops of moisture kept gathering upon his hair and mustache. He
seldom moved except to brush them away. The great open spaces made
him passive and the restlessness of the water quieted him. He intended
during the voyage to decide upon a course of action, but he held all
this away from him for the present and lay in a blessed gray
oblivion. Deep down in him somewhere his resolution was weakening and
strengthening, ebbing and flowing. The thing that perturbed him went on
as steadily as his pulse, but he was almost unconscious of it. He was
submerged in the vast impersonal grayness about him, and at intervals
the sidelong roll of the boat measured off time like the ticking of a
clock. He felt released from everything that troubled and perplexed
him. It was as if he had tricked and outwitted torturing memories, had
actually managed to get on board without them. He thought of nothing at
all.
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