"But"--here I thought her voice had a touch of breathlessness--"but who
is the officer? I mean, what is his name?"
"He stands in the group near the door of the captain's cabin, there. His
name is Galt Roscoe, I think."
A slight exclamation escaped her. There was a chilly smile on her lips,
and her eyes sought the group until it rested on Galt Roscoe. In a moment
she said "You have met him?"
"In the cemetery this morning, for the first time."
"Everybody seems to have had business this morning at the cemetery.
Justine Caron spent hours there. To me it is so foolish, heaping up a
mound, and erecting a tombstone over--what?--a dead thing, which, if one
could see it, would be dreadful."
"You would prefer complete absorption--as of the ocean?" I brutally
retorted.
She appeared not to notice the innuendo. "Yes, what is gone is gone.
Graves are idolatry. Gravestones are ghostly. It is people without
imagination who need these things, together with crape and black-edged
paper. It is all barbaric ritual. I know you think I am callous, but I
cannot help that. For myself, I wish the earth close about me, and level
green grass above me, and no one knowing of the place; or else, fire or
the sea.
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