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This time I had my eyes open and all my wits about me and I knew that we had taken a big contract. The Wavecrest was a mere cockle-shell in which to cross such a waste of open sea as that which lay between us and the mouth of Rio de la Plata. But the Wavecrest was a seaworthy craft, and that indeed had been proved.
The whole "herd" occupied a breadth extending about a mile across the sea; and in the very centre of this, as ill-luck would have it, lay the cockle-shell of a boat and the abandoned raft.
The grown-up brother of the Wermants came to Treport Raoul, with his air of a young man about town a boulevardier, with his jacket cut in the latest fashion, with his cockle-shell of a boat, which he managed as well on salt water as on fresh, sculling with his arms bare, a cigarette in his mouth, a monocle in his eye, and a pith-helmet, such as is worn in India.
Now a gentleman and lady skimmed the snow in an elegant car shaped somewhat like a cockle-shell; now a stage-sleigh with its cloth curtains thrust aside to admit the sun dashed rapidly down the street, whirling in and out among the vehicles that obstructed its passage; now came round a corner the similitude of Noah's ark on runners, being an immense open sleigh with seats for fifty people and drawn by a dozen horses.
At a nod of consent from Barrios the transport swept out of her course, passing near enough to ascertain that no one manned the little cockle-shell. It was merely a common small boat gone adrift with her oars in her. But Nostromo, to whose mind Decoud had been insistently present for days, had long before recognized with excitement the dinghy of the lighter.
The surges increased in volume, and boiled, hissing as with anger, like savage animals. Presently, the cockle-shell rose upon one very lofty swell, and Shibli Bagarag lost hold of it, and lo! it was overturned and engulfed in the descent of the great mountain of water, and the Princess Goorelka was immersed in the depths.
Just in that instant the boat caught against some obstacle, turned slowly around before the push of the current, swung loose with a jerk and floated on, the water bubbling through the flooring. A hole had been torn in the canvas, and the cockle-shell was foundering. "Sound!" shouted Thurstane to Sweeny; then, turning to Glover, "Haul up the Grizzly!"
It was open; the cushions with which it was lined were of rose-coloured plush not velvet, I think; at least if they were velvet, it was of some marvellous kind that couldn't he rubbed the wrong way, that felt exquisitely smooth and soft whichever way you stroked it; the body of the carriage was shaped something like a cockle-shell; you could lie back in it so beautifully without cricking or straining your neck or shoulders in the least; and there was just room for two.
His solemnity impressed me. "Mr. Goyles," I said, "be honest with me. Is there any hope, in any weather, of getting away from this damned hole?" Captain Goyles's kindly geniality returned to him. "You see, sir," he said, "this is a very peculiar coast. We'd be all right if we were once out, but getting away from it in a cockle-shell like that well, to be frank, sir, it wants doing."
They thus sat facing each other in the graceful yellow cockle-shell, and his eyes frequently found a resting-place in the depths of hers. The boat was so small that at each return of the sculls, when his hands came forward to begin the pull, they approached so near to her that her vivid imagination began to thrill her with a fancy that he was going to clasp his arms round her.
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