noon
It was as if she said : `` You would n't hurt me , surely ? I 'm only the little ` We 're Here ' . '' Then she would slide away chuckling softly to herself till she was brought up by some fresh obstacle . The dullest of folk can not see this kind of thing hour after hour through long days without noticing it ; and Harvey , being anything but dull , began to comprehend and enjoy the dry chorus of wave-tops turning over with a sound of incessant tearing ; the hurry of the winds working across open spaces and herding the purple-blue cloud-shadows ; the splendid upheaval of the red sunrise ; the folding and packing away of the morning mists , wall after wall withdrawn across the white floors ; the salty glare and blaze of noon ; the kiss of rain falling over thousands of dead , flat square miles ; the chilly blackening of everything at the day 's end ; and the million wrinkles of the sea under the moonlight , when the jib-boom solemnly poked at the low stars , and Harvey went down to get a doughnut from the cook . But the best fun was when the boys were put on the wheel together , Tom Platt within hail , and she cuddled her lee-rail down to the crashing blue , and kept a little home-made rainbow arching unbroken over her windlass . Then the jaws of the booms whined against the masts , and the sheets creaked , and the sails filled with roaring ; and when she slid into a hollow she trampled like a woman tripped in her own silk dress , and came out , her jib wet half-way up , yearning and peering for the tall twin-lights of Thatcher 's Island . They left the cold grey of the Bank sea , saw the lumber-ships making for Quebec by the Straits of St. Lawrence , with the Jersey salt-brigs from Spain and Sicily ; found a friendly northeaster off Artimon Bank that drove them within view of the East light of Sable Island , -- a sight Disko did not linger over , -- and stayed with them past Western and Le Have , to the northern fringe of George 's .