I
The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a flutter of the
sails, and was at rest. The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and
being bound down the river, the only thing for it was to come to and wait
for the turn of the tide.
The sea-reach of the Thames stretched before us like the beginning of an
interminable waterway. In the offing the sea and the sky were welded
together without a joint, and in the luminous space the tanned sails of the
barges drifting up with the tide seemed to stand still in red clusters of
canvas sharply peaked, with gleams of varnished sprits. A haze rested on
the low shores that ran out to sea in vanishing flatness. The air was dark
above Gravesend, and farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful
gloom, brooding motionless over the biggest, and the greatest, town on
earth.
The Director of Companies was our captain and our host. We four
affectionately watched his back as he stood in the bows looking to seaward.
On the whole river there was nothing that looked half so nautical. He
resembled a pilot, which to a seaman is trustworthiness personified. It was
difficult to realize his work was not out there in the luminous estuary, but
behind him, within the brooding gloom.
Between us there was, as I have already said somewhere, the bond of the
sea. Besides holding our hearts together through long periods of separation,
it had the effect of making us tolerant of each other’s yarns—and even
convictions. The Lawyer—the best of old fellows—had, because of his
many years and many virtues, the only cushion on deck, and was lying on
the only rug. The Accountant had brought out already a box of dominoes,
and was toying architecturally with the bones. Marlow sat cross-legged
right aft, leaning against the mizzen-mast. He had sunken cheeks, a yellow
complexion, a straight back, an ascetic aspect, and, with his arms dropped,
the palms of hands outwards, resembled an idol. The director, satisfied the
