Page 333 - nostromo-a-tale-of-the-seaboard

less words, busied themselves in making for the Isabels. The
last shower had brought with it a gentle but steady breeze.
The danger was not over yet, and there was no time for talk.
The lighter was leaking like a sieve. They splashed in the wa-
ter at every step. The Capataz put into Decoud’s hands the
handle of the pump which was fitted at the side aft, and at
once, without question or remark, Decoud began to pump
in utter forgetfulness of every desire but that of keeping
the treasure afloat. Nostromo hoisted the sail, flew back to
the tiller, pulled at the sheet like mad. The short flare of a
match (they had been kept dry in a tight tin box, though
the man himself was completely wet), disclosed to the toil-
ing Decoud the eagerness of his face, bent low over the box
of the compass, and the attentive stare of his eyes. He knew
now where he was, and he hoped to run the sinking lighter
ashore in the shallow cove where the high, cliff-like end of
the Great Isabel is divided in two equal parts by a deep and
overgrown ravine.
Decoud pumped without intermission. Nostromo
steered without relaxing for a second the intense, peering
effort of his stare. Each of them was as if utterly alone with
his task. It did not occur to them to speak. There was noth-
ing in common between them but the knowledge that the
damaged lighter must be slowly but surely sinking. In that
knowledge, which was like the crucial test of their desires,
they seemed to have become completely estranged, as if
they had discovered in the very shock of the collision that
the loss of the lighter would not mean the same thing to
them both. This common danger brought their differences

Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard