The change which impressed me so oddly was not easy to
name. The others--singing Maloney, the bustling Bo'sun's Mate, and Joan,
that fascinating half-breed of undine and salamander--all showed the
effects of a life so close to nature; but in their case the change was
perfectly natural and what was to be expected, whereas with Peter
Sangree, the Canadian, it was something unusual and unexpected.
It is impossible to explain how he managed gradually to convey to my
mind the impression that something in him had turned savage, yet this,
more or less, is the impression that he did convey. It was not that he
seemed really less civilised, or that his character had undergone any
definite alteration, but rather that something in him, hitherto dormant,
had awakened to life. Some quality, latent till now--so far, at least,
as we were concerned, who, after all, knew him but slightly--had stirred
into activity and risen to the surface of his being.
And while, for the moment, this seemed as far as I could get, it was but
natural that my mind should continue the intuitive process and
acknowledge that John Silence, owing to his peculiar faculties, and the
girl, owing to her singularly receptive temperament, might each in a
different way have divined this latent quality in his soul, and feared
its manifestation later.
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