Since leaving Singapore we had resumed our musical evenings after dinner, temporarily interrupted by Kennedy's death, and we were enjoying ourselves as usual on the evening of which I am now speaking when, while I was playing a violin solo to Miss Anthea's accompaniment, we were all startled by a sudden but very slight jarring sensation, as though the ship had lightly touched the ground for a moment. I knew that we were in the neighbourhood of the Vanguard, Prince Consort, and Prince of Wales Banks, and although I also knew that, according to our position as determined that afternoon, and the course and distance since run, we ought to be far enough away from them to be perfectly safe, the thought for a moment seized me that in some extraordinary and wholly unaccountable manner we might have been mistaken. Flinging down my violin, I rushed out on deck, closely followed by Mrs Vansittart and Monroe.

On reaching the deck I found that the jar had already created quite a small commotion, the boatswain's watch being all on the alert, while the hands below, awakened by the unaccustomed sensation, were swarming up to learn what had happened. Parker, the boatswain, was shouting for one hand to bring along the hand lead, and to another to bring a lighted lantern.

My first glance was over the side; but it was so dark that I could see nothing save a faint gleam under the lighted ports. Then the men with the lead line and lantern came along, and we took several casts of the lead. "No bottom", was the report; but even while the line was being coiled up after the last cast, the same sensation was again experienced, this time a little stronger. And then, while we were debating what it could possibly mean, one of the hands from forward came along and reassured us.

"I know what it is, sir," he explained. "I've felt the very same thing before, and not very far from here, too—while we was lyin' in Manila harbour. We couldn't make out what the mischief it was at first; but when the skipper went ashore shortly afterwards they told him that there'd been a slight shock of earthquake."

The explanation seemed quite reasonable and satisfactory, so after some little further talk we returned to the drawing-room and resumed our music. But shortly afterward we were again disturbed twice by recurrences of the same phenomenon; we accordingly gave it up, and I went off to my cabin, debating within myself whether I should change into my working rig or turn in.

Finally I decided upon the former alternative, since I did not feel much inclined for sleep, and when I had effected the change I went up on deck, thinking that possibly a spell of fresh air would bring on the desired drowsiness.

As I reached the main-deck four bells (ten o'clock) were struck, and the look-out had just responded with the stereotyped cry of "All's well!" when there occurred another shock, so violent and protracted that some of the hands cried out in terror. It is difficult to gauge the passage of time accurately at such a moment, but I think this shock must have lasted nearly, if not quite, two minutes; and the sensation to which I can most nearly compare it is that of a ship being swept and jolted over the rough surface of a coral reef by a red-hot tide.

So strong and so alarming was the shock that it created something almost amounting to panic among the crew, a few of whom, in their alarm, raised a cry to launch the boats; and it was not without some difficulty that they were eventually persuaded that the yacht was quite uninjured, and that they were therefore far safer on her deck than they could possibly be in any boat. I was not greatly surprised at their alarm, for the phenomenon was of so unusual and startling a character that, to confess the truth, I felt my own self-possession a little inclined to "wilt", as my companions would probably have put it.

Meanwhile the saloon party, like everybody else, had rushed on deck in alarm, and were eagerly discussing the occurrence. Monroe assured the two ladies that they need not be in the least degree uneasy, since, strange as the phenomenon might be to us, it was really not so very extraordinary or unusual, especially in the region where we now found ourselves; and he was making good headway in his effort to reassure his audience when suddenly there occurred another and still more violent shock. This was so pronounced that it set the sea all a-quiver with ripples, which seemed to run in the direction of all the points of the compass, crossing and recrossing each other at every conceivable angle with such rapidity that the "shaling" of the water was like that of a strong rapid, while the interlacing—so to speak—of the ripples created a sort of network of miniature breakers, easily visible because of the phosphorescence set up.

The jar and jolting of this last shock were so severe that I really began to entertain serious fears as to whether the ship could withstand them. It seemed to me that if the thing continued very long every rivet in her would be shaken or torn out of place, and the entire fabric must fall to pieces; for the deck was now quivering and jolting so violently that, to maintain our footing, we all instinctively clung to the nearest thing we could lay hands upon.

I must confess that I was more than a little astonished at the courage manifested by Mrs Vansittart and her daughter. There could be no doubt that they were greatly alarmed, yet they were more self-possessed than any of the rest of us—so much so, indeed, that Mrs Vansittart's voice was almost steady as she directed me to find Mackenzie and instruct him to start the engine. "I think I should feel more comfortable if we had the ship under command," she explained.

I had just executed this commission and returned to the poop, and the ship was already beginning to gather way, when above the hiss of the agitated water a low rumble became audible, increasing with, inconceivable rapidity to a frightful, deafening roar. The vibrations grew still more violent, and suddenly, with an awful, ear-splitting explosion, we saw a great column of flame shoot high into the air, some two miles away and almost directly ahead of us. It looked for all the world as though a gigantic cannon, planted vertically in the sea, muzzle upward, had been discharged, except that the flash of fire, instead of being only momentary, as in the case of a gun, was continuous. It remained visible for quite ten minutes, and probably endured for a much longer period. The emission of flame was accompanied by a frightful roaring sound, like that of a thousand blast furnaces, intermingled with frequent terrific explosions; and we continued to hear these long after we had lost sight of the fire.

At the first outburst of flame I instinctively sprang to the wheelhouse and ordered the dazed and terrified quartermaster to put his helm hard a-port, and let the ship sweep round in a complete half-circle, so that we might get away from the dangerous spot as speedily as possible. But we had hardly begun to turn, in response to our hard-over helm, before dense clouds of steam commenced to rise from the water round about the flame; and these soon obscured it to such an extent that the glare, which at first was almost as strong as daylight, rapidly dwindled until it became merely a great shapeless luminous blotch, growing less and less brilliant until we lost sight of it altogether as we went at full speed ahead away from it. But it was quite a quarter of an hour before we were fairly clear of the extraordinary danger that had so suddenly leaped up in our path; and within the first minute following the explosion great masses of incandescent rock mingled with flaming cinders began to fall about us on all sides, so that I regard it as nothing short of a miracle that none of the larger masses fell upon our decks. Had they done so, we must inevitably have been destroyed. As it was, we were kept busy with the hose for fully half an hour extinguishing the cinders that fell upon our deck.

Not the least remarkable circumstance connected with the phenomenon was that soon after we started the pumps the water rapidly became so hot that the men could not bear the contact of it upon their bare feet, and were obliged to don their sea boots hurriedly. At first we were fearful that the dense clouds of steam generated by the flame would spread and overtake us; but we were spared this, for almost immediately a small breeze sprang up, blowing toward the fire, and as we advanced it strengthened until it became quite a stiff breeze. To this circumstance I attribute the fact that none of our sails were set on fire by the falling cinders, for it necessitated the hurried clewing up and furling of all our canvas.

For a full hour we travelled south at full speed; and then, having apparently run beyond the limit of the danger zone, we shifted our helm and headed east until daylight, when, perceiving no sign of the eruption, and the wind having drawn round from the eastward, we set our canvas and stopped the engine. A week later we arrived at Hong-Kong without further adventure, and were amazed to learn that nothing was known there of the submarine volcanic outburst—for such, of course, it was—from which we had so narrowly escaped destruction. Nor, although we remained a week in the roadstead, during which several craft arrived from the south, and two from the Philippines, could we learn that any others than ourselves had beheld the phenomenon.

Before our arrival at Singapore it had been Mrs Vansittart's intention to proceed from that port to Manila, she being somewhat curious to see something of the United States' farthest East possession on our way north. But the United States' consul at Singapore had very strongly dissuaded her from making such a visit; we therefore skipped the Philippines, and, after spending a week at Hong-Kong, during which the saloon party made a trip to Canton and back, weighed and stood out of the harbour en route for Yokohama.

We had a good run up through the China Sea, doing the trip in ten days from port to port without being obliged to use the engine at all. Arrived in the magical land of the chrysanthemum, our lady skipper "spread herself", as she graphically expressed it, devoting a full month to the exploration of the country, and returning to the ship loaded down with priceless treasures of porcelain, pictures, carving and lacquer work, mostly designed as presents for her more stay-at-home friends in "little old N'York", when she should get back. Of course her children went with her, and Monroe, equally of course, "went along" as escort.

While Mrs Vansittart and her party were enjoying themselves the crew also had an opportunity to see something of what many regard as the most wonderful country and people in the world, the same generous rule with regard to shore leave prevailing here as elsewhere. For myself, I did not see nearly as much of the country as I should have liked, for it unfortunately happened that at the time of our visit the relations between Japan and the United States were somewhat strained in connection with the settlement of Japanese subjects on United States soil, and the Stars and Stripes was not altogether welcome in Japanese ports. Indeed, within the first week of our arrival in Yokohama harbour we had reason to suspect that a malicious attempt had been made either to damage or to destroy the yacht; and as she was in my charge during the owner's absence I did not care to leave her for more than a day at a time—and only once as long as that. But of course it must be understood that such ill feeling as undoubtedly existed was only openly manifested by private persons, and those almost entirely of the lower classes. Official Japan was the very essence of politeness and urbanity whenever we came into contact with it.

There was just one element of regret for Mrs Vansittart in her visit to Japan, and that was the unfortunate fact that Monroe developed typhoid on the very day of the party's return to Yokohama, and had to be left behind in hospital. She would most willingly have prolonged her stay until the patient's recovery; but Harper, our doctor, intervened, pointing out that, since our next cruise was to be among the Pacific Islands, it would be most inadvisable for a person newly recovered from typhoid to accompany us, as a relapse would almost certainly follow; and that the better plan would be to arrange for Monroe's return home direct by mail boat via 'Frisco. This was accordingly done, Mrs Vansittart making every arrangement for the care and comfort of the patient during his sojourn in Yokohama, and his journey to New York in all ease and comfort afterward, before giving the word for our departure.

We hove our anchor out of the mud of Yokohama harbour at ten o'clock on a certain lovely September morning, which, as Mrs Vansittart informed me incidentally, happened to be the anniversary of the yacht's departure from New York. Starting our engine, we proceeded down Yedo Bay, through Uraga Strait, and so to sea, passing Cape Mela about eight bells in the afternoon watch. Then, to a fine spanking westerly breeze, we set all plain sail and headed south for the Ladrones.

I arrive now at a point where, for a space of over two months, I find no entry in my diary of any incident worthy of special mention; this period may therefore be dismissed with the simple remark that it was spent in visiting several of the most interesting islands in the Pacific archipelago.

We sailed from Taputeuea, in the Gilbert Group, in the middle of November, and for more than a week we headed west, making good headway on the whole, although there were times when we were detained by vexatious calms, to counterbalance which we "carried on" when the wind favoured us and we had a clear sea ahead.

Such happened to be the case on a certain day in the first week of December. We had a slashing easterly breeze behind us, and fine clear weather; and the chart told us that there were no lurking dangers in our path; we therefore gave the yacht the whole flight of studding sails on both sides, and laid ourselves out to make up a little of our lost time. And we were doing so in handsome style, too, for the ship reeled off her fourteen knots hour after hour until the end of the afternoon watch, when the wind suddenly hauled four points to the southward and freshened; and although this shift of wind necessitated our handing our star board studding sails, it gave our fore-and-aft canvas a chance to put in some good work, which it did, the ship's speed going up to sixteen knots within the next hour. And for a sailing ship, sixteen knots is a very respectable speed, let me tell you, although I can recall more than one occasion when we logged nineteen, and that not only for a brief spell, but for three or four hours at a stretch. Still, sixteen knots is a pretty good pace; and it was an exhilarating sight to watch the rush of the white yacht over that glorious sapphire sea, with every sail accurately set and trimmed and tugging at the beautiful hull like a team of cart horses, the long, weighty swell chasing us, wind-whipped and capped with seething crests of snow-white foam, while the great, glass-smooth bow wave went roaring away on either hand with its hissing and leaping crown of froth sparkling like gems in the rays of the declining sun.

I think Mrs Vansittart was never more proud of her beautiful ship than she was on that particular evening, as she stood with me on the poop and critically marked our rush through the water and every perfection of hull, spar, and sail. The yacht was a lovely picture, even as beheld by us from her poop; but I would have given a trifle for the privilege of seeing her as she must have appeared at such a moment from a passing ship, had there been such a craft. But, as it happened, there was not; we had the sea to ourselves, for we chanced just then to be traversing a stretch of water very rarely frequented by craft of any description.

It happened to be my eight hours out on that particular night, and when, at eight bells of the first watch, I turned the ship over to Parker, the boatswain, we were still reeling off our sixteen knots, with a fresh, steady breeze from the south-east. It was a dark night, for the moon was only two days old, and had set long ago, while a thin veil of cloud hid most of the stars. Had we been in much-frequented waters I should perhaps have considered it a bit reckless to drive the ship so hard through the darkness; but we were not, and I retired to my cabin with an easy mind, and, undressing at once, tumbled into my bunk and fell sound asleep almost as my head touched the pillow.



CHAPTER NINE.

WRECKED!

How long I slept I have no means of knowing. All I can remember is that from a sound, dreamless sleep, I was startled into sudden wakefulness by experiencing a shock of such tremendous violence that my first real consciousness of anything being amiss was caused by me finding myself hurled headlong out of my bunk to the deck of my cabin. I fell so awkwardly that I seemed to land fair upon my right temple, and, after an instant of sharp pain, I forthwith lost all consciousness for a length of time that must have been considerable, although I never had the means to guess it even approximately. But I remember one thing distinctly. Even as I was in the very act of falling, a terrific rending crash sounded in my ears, and the thought flashed through my brain: "There go the masts by the board!"

The return of consciousness manifested itself in a hazy and quite detached perception that I was being violently shaken by the shoulder; while a voice, pitched in aggrieved and petulant tones—which I presently recognised as those of the lad, Julius—exhorted me to "Wake up!" At first these exhortations produced no particular effect upon me. I was aware of them, but that was all; they had no definite meaning so far as I was concerned. I did not even trouble to ask myself why I should wake up. Then after a period of silence, during which I perhaps slipped back into unconsciousness, I became aware that water was being vigorously dashed in my face, while Julius's voice resumed its petulant appeal.

"Oh, I say, dash it all! do wake up, Leigh," I heard the boy exclaim. "Wake up, I tell you! Momma's blocked into her cabin, and Sis and I can't get her out. And you're the only one of the crew left!"

I suppose my wits must have been reasserting themselves by that time, for these words conveyed some sort of definite meaning to me, especially that last statement: "You're the only one of the crew left." The only one of the crew! What crew? Why, of course, the crew of the Stella Maris, in which I had some recollection of having spent a very pleasant time. Then, as memory began to work, I recalled the tremendous shock which had hurled me, scarcely awake, out of my bunk, and the jarring, rending crash that had reached my ears in the very act of falling. What did these things mean? I asked myself, and the answer came without much groping for. What could they mean, except that some disaster had overtaken the yacht?

I opened my eyes, and by the light of a rapidly growing dawn perceived, first, that I was still in my own cabin, and secondly, that Julius was bending over me with a water jug in one hand and a tumbler in the other, from the latter of which he had just dashed a quantity of water in my face. Also I was conscious of a splitting headache, and a burning, smarting sensation in the right temple. I put up my hand, passed it over the seat of the pain, and was immediately conscious of an increased smart. As I lowered my hand I looked at it stupidly: it was smeared with blood.

"Oh, that's nothing!" commented the boy, as I looked questioningly at the ruddy stain; "you've cut your forehead a bit, that's all. Thank goodness, you've woke up at last! I thought at first you'd handed in your checks. Now, I say, just get up and come with me to the drawing-room. Momma's somehow pinned in her cabin, and I want you to get her out."

"All right!" I said; "I'll come. But what has happened to the ship? She seems to be—"

"I dunno," replied the boy. "She's wrecked, that's all that I can tell you. Her three masts are broken; and, exceptin' Momma, 'Thea, and I, you're the only person left."

"The only person left!" I ejaculated, as I staggered to my feet. "Good Heavens, boy, what do you mean?"

"Just exactly what I say," returned Master Julius. "And see here, you," he continued aggressively, "don't you dare to call me 'boy' again. I don't like it, and I won't have it. See?"

"Certainly," I replied, with a smile at the lad's astonishing touchiness at such a moment; "I both see and hear. All right! I apologise. And now, what is this you say about your mother? She is jammed in her cabin and can't get out? I will go and attend to her first; and when she has been released I must look into that other matter of the missing crew."

"I guess the first thing you'll do after you've got Momma out of her cabin will be to get my breakfast ready, and don't you forget it!" retorted the boy.

While we talked I had been hastily dressing, and until I had finished I said nothing. I suppose it was the blow on the head that I had received, coupled with the growing consciousness that some disaster, far more frightful than I had thus far dreamed of, had befallen us, that made me suddenly irritable and short-tempered then. Anyhow, the lad's manner jarred upon me at the moment to such an extent that, as I was about to lead the way through the doorway of my cabin, I halted and turned upon the youngster.

"Look here, my lad," I said. "If what you say is true, that only your mother, your sister, you and I are left aboard this ship, somebody will have to take charge of things, and that somebody will be myself. There will be a multitude of things to be done, and you will have to lend a hand. And I will see that you do so. Henceforth it will be I who will give orders; and—understand me, my young friend—if I give you an order, you will execute it, or I'll know the reason why. Hitherto, it seems to me, you have been spoiled by too much indulgence; but if this ship proves to be a wreck, as I more than suspect is the case, there will be no more spoiling for you, and I'll see if I cannot make something like a man of you. Now, just turn that saying over in your mind, and don't let me have any more of your nonsense. Now we will go and see what can be done for your mother. Come along!"

For a moment I really thought that the boy meant to strike me, but I kept my eyes steadily staring into his, and presently I saw that I had mastered him, for the moment at all events. The gleam of mingled anger and defiance faded out of his eyes, and he muttered: "All right! let's go."

As we wended our way from my cabin to the drawing-room, abaft which Mrs Vansittart's cabin was situate, I had time to note several matters. The first of these was that the ship was evidently hard and fast aground; for although she rolled slightly from time to time the motion was not continuous like that of a floating ship, but intermittent, with intervals when she did not move at all, but lay motionless with a list to starboard. Also, when she moved, there was a gritty, grinding sound, which at once suggested to me that she was lying upon a bed of coral. There was also another sound, a bumping sound, accompanied by a perceptible jar of the hull, recurring at frequent and pretty regular intervals, which I set down to the bumping of wreckage alongside. The next thing I observed was that the lee side of the deck was about a foot or more deep in water, showing that a very considerable quantity must have come below, the greater part of it probably through the hatchways, although some had no doubt come in through the open ports.

Then I went up the hatchway ladder to the main-deck. Heavens! what a picture of wreck and ruin I there beheld! The three hollow steel masts were snapped off close to the deck, and now, with all attached, were over the starboard side, still fast to the hull by the standing and running gear, which lay, a confused raffle of wire and hemp, across the deck. The mizenmast, heel upward, leaned against the side of the poop in a slanting position, showing that it had fallen forward as well as sideways; and immediately to leeward, in the water that heaved and seethed round us, rose and fell a tangle of wrecked spars, sails, and rigging. Every inch of the bulwarks, from poop to topgallant forecastle on both sides, had disappeared, leaving only the bent and broken steel stanchions standing here and there. The deckhouses were gone, as were every one of the boats except the motor launch, and even she was represented only by a shattered, fragmentary skeleton. Four of the six main-deck guns in the starboard battery were either smashed or missing altogether; and, in short, the whole appearance of the main-deck was such as to suggest that the ship had been repeatedly swept from end to end by a succession of tremendously heavy seas.

All these things I observed during my brief passage from the after hatchway to the face of the poop. I also observed that no land was in sight from the main-deck; therefore, if we had hit an unknown atoll during the night, it must be so small as to be entirely hidden by the poop.

Followed submissively enough by the boy, who now seemed tongue-tied, I passed through the cabin into the drawing-room; and it gave me quite a sharp pain to see the dreadful havoc that had been wrought in that splendid apartment since I had left it only a few hours before. For not only had all the ports been left open during the night, for the sake of coolness, but the skylight and companion had both been swept away, and, from the appearance of things, tons of water must have flooded the place. Even now, when it had had time to drain away to a small extent, the lee side of the room was flooded to the depth of fully four feet, and chairs, ottomans, table, grand piano, organ—the latter capsized—in fact, everything movable had settled away to leeward, and now lay in a confused heap in the water. The rich carpet was everywhere sodden, several of the electric-light shades were smashed, two or three of the pictures had fallen; in short, the destruction was practically complete. And there, in the midst of all the ruin, stood poor little Anthea, a most forlorn and pathetic-looking object.

I hastened toward her with the idea of saying something comforting, though what I could have said I am sure I don't know. Happily, she forestalled me by coming to meet me with outstretched hands.

"Oh! Mr Leigh," she exclaimed, "isn't this just awful! I am so glad you are here, for Momma is in her cabin and can't get out; and Jule and I haven't been strong enough to help her. She says that the wardrobe has fallen across her door, and she cannot move it."

"All right!" I said; "I will see what I can do to help her;" and I moved toward the door in question.

"But don't you think you had better get some of the men to help you?" demanded the girl. "I guess that wardrobe is a pretty heavy piece of furniture and—But what are you looking at me like that for? And what have you done to your head?"

"Hasn't Julius told you?" I asked, ignoring the last question.

"Told me what?" returned Anthea. Then, without waiting for a reply, she continued. "No, he hasn't told me a thing. In fact, I haven't seen him since he left me nearly an hour ago to get help. Of course I know that we're wrecked, and goodness knows that's bad enough. There's nothing worse than that to tell, is there?"

"I don't know for certain," I said, "but I fear so. Julius says that we three and your mother are all that remain of the entire ship's company; but I pray Heaven that he may be mistaken. However, we will free your mother; and then I will take a good look round. I have scarcely had a chance to see anything yet."

I walked up to the closed door of Mrs Vansittart's cabin, Anthea and Julius accompanying me, and knocked.

"It is Walter Leigh," I cried. "Julius tells me that you are blockaded in your room, madam, and cannot force your way out. May I see what I can do?"

"Pray do, if you please," was the response. "I have been shut up here for hours, terrified and half-drowned, and I want to get out. Have you anybody there to help you?"

"Only Julius," I replied. "But I daresay we can manage, between us."

"I don't believe you can," retorted Mrs Vansittart. "There is a wardrobe right across the door, and it is so heavy that I cannot move it. Still, you may try."

"Right!" I replied. "Stand clear, if you please. Now, Julius, put your shoulder to the door, close to the frame, and throw your whole weight upon it. I will help you."

But the door would not move, strive as we might, and soon I realised that the lad was a hindrance rather than a help. So I told him to stand aside, and was then able to bring my whole weight and strength to bear. Presently I felt the door move, ever so little; I had started it, and after some minutes of strenuous heaving I managed to force it so far open that, with a little tight squeezing, I might push myself through the aperture. This I did, having first asked permission; and, once inside the room, I managed to shift the blockading wardrobe without very much difficulty, and so to release the imprisoned lady.

When I had hooked back the door, so that the way was open, Mrs Vansittart turned to me and said:

"Thank you, ever so much, Walter! And now, tell me, what dreadful thing has happened? We are stranded, are we not, and—What is the matter with your head? You are bleeding! Tell me the worst, Walter! Whatever it is, I believe I can bear it."

"To confess the truth, madam," I said, "I scarcely know yet what is the full extent of our misfortune. That the ship is ashore—on a coral reef, as I believe—and totally dismasted, is certain; and I fear that that is not the worst of it. Julius tells me that we four are the only survivors of the entire ship's company, but I can hardly believe that. There must be some of the crew left somewhere in the ship, although I saw no sign of them when I came here from my cabin. Probably I should not have been here now but for the fact that when the ship struck I was hurled out of my bunk with such violence that I was stunned; and it was Julius who found and revived me. With your permission, I will now take a thorough look round, and then return to you with my report."

"Please do so," assented Mrs Vansittart. "Search the ship thoroughly from end to end, and then let me know exactly how matters stand. I am sure it cannot be anything like so bad as you say. Some of the poor fellows may have been, indeed probably were, swept away by those awful seas that broke over the ship when she first struck; but all of them! Oh, no, it cannot be so bad as that; it would be too terrible!"

"I will go at once," I said. "But I beg that you will prepare yourself for bad news; for, from what I saw on deck just now, on my way here, I am afraid my report will be a very distressing one."

Therewith I hurried away, for I saw that the poor lady was quite overwhelmed, and would probably be relieved to find herself alone for a time. I searched the ship thoroughly, penetrating to every part of her in which it was possible for a man to hide himself, but found nobody, until at length I made my way to the stewardesses' quarters. There, huddled up in the cabin which they shared between them, I discovered the chief and assistant stewardess, quite unhurt but half-crazy with terror—so frightened, indeed, that it was only with the greatest difficulty I at length succeeded in persuading them that all danger was over for the present, and induced them to join their mistress in the drawing-room.

Then I proceeded to investigate the condition of the wreck. The yacht had been constructed like a liner, with a double bottom; and the conclusion at which I arrived was that the actual bottom of the ship was so seriously damaged that she would never float again, but that the inner skin was intact; and that the water in her interior, of which there was a very considerable quantity, had all come in through the hatchways and ports.

With regard to the loss of the crew, I believed I could understand exactly how it had come about; for, wherever I went, whether to the men's berthage in the 'tween decks or to the officers' cabins, the indications were the same, and pointed to the conviction that when the ship struck, every man below leaped out of his bunk or hammock and dashed up on deck in something of a panic, where they were washed overboard, with the watch already on deck, by the terrific seas that must at once have swept the ship from stem to stern, their awful power being sufficiently evidenced by the scene of destruction presented by the decks.

Having completed my investigation below, I ascended to the poop, shinning up by one of the port mizen shrouds, which trailed across the deck and hung down over the face of the poop, both ladders being missing; and when I got up there and was able to see all round the ship, I thought I began to understand a little more clearly what had happened during the darkness of the preceding night.

I found that the ship had piled herself up on a small atoll, some two miles in diameter, only a very small portion of which—less than a hundred yards in length—showed above water. This portion, consisting of a low bank of sand, the highest point of which could not, I estimated, be more than three feet above the level of the ocean's surface, lay directly astern of the ship, distant about half a mile. From the position which the wreck then occupied I surmised that in the darkness of the preceding night we must have rushed headlong upon the weathermost portion of the reef, and beaten through the terrific surf that everlastingly broke upon it. Our decks had been swept of everything animate and inanimate in the process, until the vessel had settled down on the top of the reef in the comparatively smooth water that then surrounded us, which, though it boiled and seethed all round the wreck, had power only to cause her to stir gently and at intervals upon her coral bed when an extra heavy swell swept across the reef.

Of course the wreck ought not to have occurred; but Parker, the boatswain, who was in charge of the ship when she piled herself up, unfortunately happened to overhear Mrs Vansittart remark, only the day before the disaster, that we were then in a part of the ocean which was not only very sparsely used, but, according to the charts, was supposed to be absolutely void of dangers. Hence I imagine he must not only have grown careless himself, but must also have permitted the look-outs to become so also; with the result that, on such a pitch-dark night as the preceding one had been, the ship would be absolutely on top of the danger, and escape from it impossible, before its existence was discovered.

Well, our plight, although bad enough in all conscience, might easily have been a good deal worse. For if the ship had remained afloat a few minutes longer than she actually did, she would have driven completely across the reef and sunk in the lagoon, when probably the whole of us who happened to be below would have gone down with her, and the disaster would have been complete. As it was, there were half a dozen of us who had escaped drowning, although our prospects for the future were anything but brilliant. To start with, the diminutive sandbank astern of the wreck was impossible as a place of prolonged residence, though we might, perhaps, if driven to it, contrive to exist for a few days upon the shellfish which no doubt might be collected along the margin of the inner beach, assisted, perhaps, by a few sea-birds' eggs. But there was no fresh water, so far as I could discover with the aid of the ship's telescope, nor was there so much as a blade of grass in the way of shelter.

Therefore it was perfectly evident that we must stick to the wreck until something came along to take us off, or until I could put together something in the nature of a craft or raft capable of being handled under sail and of making a voyage to the nearest civilised land. That, as anyone who has used the sea will know, was a pretty tall order for a young fellow like myself, with such assistance only as four women and a boy could afford me. Of course there was the possibility that the wreck might break up during the next gale. But I hardly thought she would, because she must have driven to her present berth while last night's breeze was at its height, and from the look of things generally I doubted whether a sea heavy enough to destroy her would ever reach us where we then lay. The reef would break it up and render it practically harmless before it could get so far as the spot which we occupied.

Still, I realised that it would not be wise to trust too much to that belief; and I determined to get to work upon some sort of craft at the earliest moment possible. Meanwhile, however, since under the most favourable circumstances the wreck must obviously be our home for some time to come, unless indeed we should be lucky enough to be seen and taken off, the first thing to be done was to clear the ship of water and get the cabins dry again as speedily as possible; and I determined that I would make that my first job.

Having now decided upon something in the nature of a plan of campaign, I returned to the drawing-room, descending to it by way of the companion— the stairway of which was still intact—with the object of making my report to Mrs Vansittart and submitting my plans for her approval. But when I reached the apartment I found the occupants in the very act of descending to the dining-room, in order to partake of breakfast. This had been prepared by the two stewardesses, the senior of whom—the young Frenchwoman, Lizette Charpentier, who also acted as Mrs Vansittart's maid—had just made her appearance with the information that the meal was ready. I therefore decided to postpone what I had to say until after breakfast, believing that everybody would be the better able to listen to bad news if they were first fortified with a good meal.



CHAPTER TEN.

ADAPTING OURSELVES TO CIRCUMSTANCES.

To ward off the enquiries that sprang to Mrs Vansittart's lips the moment I appeared was a little difficult, but I managed it by simply declining to say a word until after breakfast. When, however, we presently all sat down at the table together, I soon perceived that the task of breaking to her the full extent of the night's disaster, to which I had been looking forward with dread, was likely to be less painful than I had anticipated. For Mrs Vansittart was far too experienced in nautical matters to be easily deceived. Moreover, during my absence there had been time for her to think, and to draw her own conclusions, not only from what she saw and heard, but also from what she failed to see and hear—particularly the sound of men's voices and footsteps. So that, as the meal progressed, I began to understand that it would require very little effort on my part to bring complete realisation home to her.

Poor lady! I felt very sorry for her—not so much on account of the possible hardships, privations, and dangers that only too probably awaited her, for she was "grit" all through, and I knew that she would face them all without a murmur; but it was easy to see that she was grieving over the terrible loss of life that had attended the disaster. Also, I rather imagined she blamed herself for it. For when I ventured to beg her not to take the matter too much to heart, she looked at me through her tears and retorted:

"How can I help taking it to heart, Walter? If I had been content to enjoy life in the same way that other women of my class do, this would never have happened. But I must needs go gadding about the world in a yacht; and this is what has come of it!"

I replied that yachting was not in itself more dangerous than many other forms of amusement which could easily be named; that thousands indulged in it year after year with impunity; and that what had befallen us was neither more nor less than a pure accident, for which she certainly could in nowise hold herself responsible, since she had navigated the ship with skill and the observance of every necessary precaution. I went on to say that the accident had arisen simply from the existence of a coral reef which nobody had thus far suspected. But my arguments, sound as I felt them to be, seemed to influence the lady very little, if at all. I could only hope that time, reflection, and the difficulties that lay before us would gradually divert her thoughts from the sorrow that just then seemed to possess her.

At the conclusion of the meal I took her up on the poop and allowed her to view our surroundings, expounded my theory of the various happenings that had brought us to our present pass, and explained the steps which I suggested should be immediately taken. To which she responded by saying:

"Very well, Walter. Whatever you think necessary do, and we will all help you to the utmost of our ability. I can sail and navigate a ship, as you have seen, but there my seamanship ends. I have not the knowledge, the skill, the experience, the intuitiveness and imaginativeness to deal adequately with, such a matter as a shipwreck. And when people are in such a plight as ourselves it is the man who must take hold of the situation and handle it. I trust entirely to you to do what you think best; and, as I said before, we women will help you all we can."

I thanked her very heartily for her trust in me, and proposed that we should forthwith set to work, our first task being to free the habitable portions of the ship from water, so that they might become dry and comfortable again with the least possible delay. And I suggested that we should begin with her own sleeping cabin, to which she made no objection.

"There is one other matter," I added, "which demands our immediate attention. We must at once determine the exact position of the wreck, and, having done so, must prepare a statement briefly setting forth our plight and requesting assistance. This statement must be copied out several times—as many times as you please, indeed—and the copies, enclosed in sealed bottles, sent adrift at, say, daily intervals. It will be strange indeed if, out of four or five dozen bottles, not one is picked up."

The suggestion appealed to Mrs Vansittart. She pronounced the idea a good one, and as the time and conditions were alike favourable we forthwith proceeded to carry it out, she first taking a set of five sights for the determination of the longitude while I noted the chronometer times, and then, vice versa, I taking the sextant and she the chronometer. Then we adjourned to the chart-room and worked out our calculations independently, the results agreeing within ten seconds of longitude, or a difference of only a few hundred feet. This, of course, was quite near enough for all practical purposes, but it did not completely satisfy either of us, Mrs Vansittart being, like myself, something of a stickler for absolute accuracy. We therefore tried again, this time working the problem of "equal altitudes", and before the day was out we had arrived at identical results, both as to latitude and longitude.

Then, while I tackled the task of clearing our living quarters of water, Mrs Vansittart set to work to draft out a statement setting forth the circumstances of the wreck and appealing for help. I have still a copy of the document in my possession, which runs as follows:—

"Yacht Stella Maris; New York Yacht Club, U.S.A.; Mrs Cornelia Vansittart, Owner. Latitude — North; Longitude — East.

"To all whom it may concern.

"The full-rigged, auxiliary-screw yacht Stella Maris, stranded on an uncharted coral reef, situate in the above-mentioned position, during the night of Wednesday the — day of December, 19—, with the lamentable loss of all hands excepting the owner, her son and daughter, chief officer Walter Leigh, of Newton Ferrers, Devonshire, England; Lizette Charpentier, chief stewardess, and Susie Blaine, second stewardess, both of New York, U.S.A.

"As the only land in sight is a very small, bare sandbank, quite uninhabitable, the above-named survivors are remaining upon the wreck, which, although totally dismasted and badly bilged, will afford them a refuge so long as the weather remains fine, but may break up during the next gale that chances to occur.

"Mrs Vansittart offers a reward of ten thousand dollars (American), and the reimbursement of all expenses incurred, to the person or persons who will effect the rescue of herself and her companions in misfortune; and the finder of this document is earnestly besought to make public its contents as soon as found.

Signed: "Cornelia Vansittart."

The first copy of this appeal was dispatched that very day, by the simple process of wrapping it carefully in oiled silk, inserting it in an empty bottle, which was tightly corked and sealed, and heaving it overboard to take its chance. As I stood watching the bottle's progress I was gratified to see that there was a one-knot current setting across the reef, which I hoped would carry it clear into the open sea; though whether it would ever be found by anyone capable of making intelligent use of it was quite another matter. The chances of it being seen were small, and of its recovery still less. But I determined to increase both before dispatching the next message; and this I did by routing out some paint and setting the boy Julius to the task of painting a number of bottles all over in alternate bands of red and white. An ordinary floating bottle might be seen and passed without the smallest effort to pick it up, even though all the conditions for recovery should be favourable. But I argued that if a bottle were seen bearing distinguishing marks that were obviously put upon it with the object of attracting attention, the person sighting it might reasonably conclude that it would be worth while to salve it and ascertain its contents.

If the sight of our first call for help drifting placidly seaward across the lagoon was an agreeable sight, there was another which appeared later on that was by no means so agreeable—the dorsal fins of several sharks cruising lazily here and there about the lagoon. I thought I could make a pretty shrewd guess at the meaning of their presence there, I therefore devised a number of pretexts for keeping everybody off the poop, so that there might be as little chance as possible of anyone beholding the gruesome sight.

There were so many matters demanding immediate attention that it was difficult to determine which of them should first be taken in hand. But as the weather was fine, and the barometer stood high, exhibiting a tendency to rise still higher and thus promising a continuance of fine weather, it was agreed that, for health's sake, the living quarters should be cleared of water and thoroughly aired and made wholesome first of all. This was accordingly done, the task keeping us all busily employed for the best part of three days. Then provision had to be made against the further flooding of Mrs Vansittart's cabin and the drawing-room by rain, for, as has already been mentioned, the skylights and companion had been swept away, and the corresponding apertures in the deck were quite open and unprotected.

Very fortunately, a large quantity of timber scantling and planking of various kinds and dimensions had been shipped by our far-seeing owner, for the purpose of effecting repairs at sea, if required. As soon as the cabins had been cleared of water, therefore, some of this timber was brought on deck; and with the aid of the carpenter's tools, Julius and I proceeded to plank over the openings, and make them weather-proof by covering the planking with tarpaulins tightly nailed over them.

When I first invited the boy to help me he refused point-blank, upon two distinct pleas: the first of which was that he saw no reason why he should work at all, seeing that I was there to do what needed to be done; while, in the second place, if he chose to work at all he would do only such work as he pleased, and in any case was not going to be ordered about by any darned Britisher. So I just let him severely alone, and for the first day he loafed about, smoking cigarettes and pretending to fish in the troubled water over the side.

When, however, on the second day, seeing that I needed help, his mother and sister came to my assistance, the sight of them working while he idled was too much for even his spoiled and selfish temper; and with many grumblings and mutterings below his breath he ordered his mother away and took her place. But so intractable was he, so unwilling to receive the slightest suggestion or hint from a "darned Britisher", and so determined to do things his own way or not at all, that eventually I had to tell him plainly he must consent to do as he was told, or drop work altogether. Finally he gave in, mainly in consequence of his sister's outspoken comments upon his behaviour, but it was with a very bad grace.

Having made the living quarters of the ship once more habitable and safe against bad weather, the next task undertaken was the salving of the sails and as many of the spars and as much of the rigging as possible. This was a lengthy and heavy job, in the performance of which it became necessary for me to be frequently over the side, in the water, cutting the sails from the yards and stays, clearing and unreeving rigging, and so on. It would have been exceedingly dangerous had the sharks which I had seen during the first few days remained in the lagoon; but they seemed to have gone again, for I saw nothing of them.

Although their absence enabled me to work with the utmost freedom, I could not make very rapid headway, single-handed, in the water; while the hoisting inboard of the heavier spars and sails, assisted though we were with such appliances as a derrick, tackles, snatch-blocks, and the winch, taxed our energies to the very utmost. It was done at last, however, and most thankful was I when the last spar it was possible for us to secure came up over the side; for not only had we saved a considerable quantity of material that might possibly prove of the utmost value to us, but we had also rid ourselves of the menace of having the ship holed by the wreckage bumping alongside.

This big task was completed exactly six weeks from the day upon which the wreck had occurred, all of us working strenuously from dawn to dark day after day, excepting Sundays, which Mrs Vansittart insisted should be observed as days of rest, during which she conducted a service, morning and evening, in the drawing-room. Christmas Day, which occurred three weeks after the wreck, was also observed as a holiday; and despite our forlorn and rather precarious situation, we contrived to make a fairly jolly day of it, the only discordant element being the boy Julius, who early became sulky for some unaccountable reason, and spent the entire day upon the topgallant forecastle with a rifle, shooting at sea-birds and wasting some two hundred rounds of ball cartridge. I felt strongly inclined several times to take the rifle forcibly from him, but the mere hint of such a thing seemed to distress his mother so keenly that I did not refer to it a second time. Yet I must confess that I bitterly begrudged the utterly useless expenditure of so many good and, in our case, valuable cartridges.

Now, it must not be supposed that, in our anxiety to recover as much wreckage as possible, we forgot to keep a diligent look-out for passing ships, for we did not. Nor did we neglect to dispatch a copy of our appeal for help, securely sealed up in a bottle, regularly every day. But thus far the horizon had remained blank while daylight lasted; therefore if perchance any ships had passed us, they must have done so during the night. Up to this we had all been working so hard that we had deemed it hardly worth while to sacrifice our hours of rest for the very doubtful advantage of maintaining a night watch; but with the conclusion of what we considered our heaviest task, so far as actual labour was concerned, we decided that it might be of advantage to keep a look-out at night time, at least during the moonlit nights. We should then be able to see a passing ship at such a distance as would enable us to attract her attention by means of a flare. Accordingly it was arranged that four of us, namely, Julius, the two stewardesses, and I, should each take one watch in succession.

In that latitude, which was only a few degrees north of the Line, day and night were approximately of equal length, and for all practical purposes the night might be reckoned as beginning at six p.m., and ending at six a.m. Therefore if each of us kept a watch of three hours, we should cover the twelve hours between us. But by this arrangement the same person would keep one particular watch every night, and, of course, the least arduous of the watches would be that from six o'clock to nine o'clock p.m.; I therefore decided to split this watch into two dog-watches of one and a half hours each, by which arrangement the regularity would be broken, and each of us would get the benefit of the first dog-watch in succession, which seemed to be not only a fair but a desirable thing.

To keep a night watch, however, without possessing the means to attract the notice of a passing ship, would be useless. I therefore constructed a sort of framework consisting of four twelve-foot planks, which I set up on edge in the form of a square enclosure on the after extremity of the poop, securing them firmly to the deck planking by means of battens. The planks were nine inches wide, consequently when my work was complete I had a kind of open box twelve feet square and nine inches deep in which to light my flare. But something was needed to protect the deck from the action of the fire; my next act, therefore, was to nail together a sort of light raft, consisting of six fifteen-foot planks laid side by side and secured to each other by cross battens, the forward ends being bevelled to reduce the resistance to the raft's passage through the water. Then I fixed up an arrangement on each side of the raft whereby, with the aid of rowlocks, I could work a pair of sculls and so propel the raft through the water. This job took me two days to complete, but when it was done I had a raft that would sustain not only my own weight but something to spare. I placed upon it a couple of wash-deck tubs, put a shovel in one of them, and paddled myself ashore to the small sandbank about half a mile away.

As I rowed away from the wreck, standing up to my work and facing forward, fisherman fashion, I took a rather wide sweep, whereby I was enabled to obtain a good view of her. A pitiful sight she presented, bereft of her three masts, with her jib-boom snapped short off, odds and ends of rigging trailing overboard, a great gap in her starboard bulwarks, and the fair whiteness of her hull disfigured here and there with rust streaks. She sat with a list to starboard, and was a trifle down by the head, from which latter circumstance I concluded that her forefoot and bottom forward were the most seriously damaged parts of her, as, indeed, it was only reasonable to suppose, seeing that she must have hit the reef stem-on. But, oh! it was distressing to look at that still beautiful though dishevelled hull and reflect that she had been brought to her present lamentable condition by pure negligence.

The raft travelled more easily through the water than I had dared to hope, and in about a quarter of an hour I reached the sandbank and sprang ashore, taking the precaution to secure the raft by a painter made fast to one of the oars, the loom of which I drove well into the sand. Then I walked to the highest point of the bank and looked about me.

With the exception of a few bunches of dry and rotting seaweed, the bank was as bare as the back of my hand, but a colony of gulls had settled upon it, and by their cries indicated the resentment which they felt at my intrusion. I looked round to see if I could discover any eggs, for fresh gulls' eggs are not at all bad eating, and would perhaps afford a welcome change of diet to the women folk; but I found none, so concluded that it was not just then the season for them. The bank measured, by pacing, a little over eighty yards long by some forty broad; and I diligently examined the seaward side of it to see whether perchance there might be a spring of fresh water gushing out of it. I hardly expected that there would be, and was therefore not greatly disappointed at failing to find any such thing. But I found the margin liberally strewed with small shellfish, as well as with numerous empty shells, some of which were so exquisite, both in form and in colouring, that I could not resist the temptation to waste a few minutes in securing specimens of the most beautiful for the delectation of Mrs Vansittart and her daughter. This done, I returned to the raft, hauled it broadside on to the beach, and proceeded to fill my two wash-deck tubs with sand, with which I designed to fill my square box-like arrangement on the poop as a protection for the deck from the flames of my projected flare. Needless to say, two tubs of sand did not go very far toward filling the box, and it was not until the following evening that I had everything ready. Then, with a goodly pile of combustibles, consisting of dry seaweed, chips, kindling wood, and coal, heaped up in the middle of my sandbox, I had everything ready for lighting a flare at a moment's notice.

Our most pressing necessities having been attended to, I found time to attend to the matter which seemed to come next in importance. Hitherto we had been favoured with the finest of fine weather—nothing but the bluest of skies, often without the smallest shred of cloud, no rain, and only the most gentle of zephyrs. But I knew that such a condition of things could not last for ever. A change must inevitably come sooner or later; and if that change should chance to take the form of a gale from the southward, I had scarcely a shadow of doubt that, unless it should happen to be of the very briefest character, the wreck would go to pieces under our feet. Therefore it seemed to me that the task which now clamoured most loudly for our immediate attention was the construction of a craft of some sort which would enable us to escape in the last resort.

Now, there are very few tasks in connection with his craft which mercantile Jack cannot perform in a more or less efficient manner. He can unrig his ship, and rig her afresh. If any of her spars should be sprung, he can fix them up in such a fashion that they will serve their purpose very well until a new spar can be procured. He can knot and splice rigging; he can patch or rope a sail; and there are a thousand other things that he can do very deftly. But there is one thing which he cannot do, unless he has served an apprenticeship, or at least part of an apprenticeship to it, and that is—build a boat. He can repair a damaged boat, I grant you, put in a new plank, or replace a damaged timber. But to build a boat, as we understand the term, is altogether beyond him. The best that he can do is to construct some sort of a makeshift; and the problem that now confronted me was, what form was my makeshift to take?

First, what were my requirements? If it came to our being obliged to abandon the wreck, either through stress of weather or because of a conviction that our appeals for help had gone astray and that we must give up all hope of rescue and effect our own deliverance, it would mean a boat voyage. This in its turn would mean that the craft must be a good sea boat, capable of facing any weather, weatherly, a reasonably good sailer, and big enough to accommodate six people—four of whom were women, whose comfort and welfare must receive special consideration— together with a stock of provisions and water sufficient to last us all for, say, five weeks at least. I had already discussed this matter with Mrs Vansittart, and she had expressed a determination to try for Manila, in such a case, that being an American possession. Secondly, had we the materials, and had I the skill and strength to build such a boat, with such assistance as my companions could afford me? That was the question which now demanded an answer, and, in consultation with Mrs Vansittart, I now diligently proceeded to seek the reply.



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

A SUSPICIOUS SAIL HEAVES IN SIGHT.

As I have already hinted, I was no boat builder. I knew a good boat when I saw her, and I had a very fair notion of the correct proportions of such a craft; but when it came to the point of draughting a vessel's lines, I very soon discovered, upon making the attempt, that I was all at sea. Nor could Mrs Vansittart help me. As a matter of fact, we quickly came to the conclusion that we knew just enough of the subject to be painfully conscious of our own ignorance. Of course I might have laid a keel, attached to it a stem and stern post, and then, with the help of a few moulds, roughed out something resembling a boat; but when in imagination I had got thus far, I found myself face to face with the mystery of properly shaping the planks, and, when this was done, of bending them to the correct curves. Then I realised that the job was too much for me.

It was clear that a boat of the usual form was out of the question, so something very much simpler must be thought out—something that should be all straight lines, or if there were any curves they must be of such a character as to be producible without such special apparatus as, for instance, a steaming trunk.

Then Mrs Vansittart and I began to overhaul our memories in search of the most simple form of floating craft that we had ever seen, and it was not long before we decided that the Thames punt "filled the bill". That craft, so familiar to frequenters of the reaches of the Thames, and examples of which may be seen in Boulter's Lock any Sunday in summer, is, as everybody knows, a thing of straight lines, flat-bottomed, flat-sided—in fact, an open box, with its two ends sloping instead of perpendicular; and we quickly decided that anyone with enough of the carpenter's skill to knock a box together ought to be able to build a punt. Later on we discovered that we were not quite right in this assumption, but it was sufficiently encouraging to form a basis upon which to make a start.

Now, a sea voyage in an open boat is something to be attempted only as a last resource. A trip of a few hours' duration in suitable weather is all very well; it is, indeed, a very enjoyable experience. But in a gale, when one is exposed hour after hour to the fury of the elements, is in momentary danger of being capsized, and has to bale for dear life!

Well, those who have been through it know what that means. I had been through it, therefore I knew that for those delicately nurtured women it was not to be thought of for a moment; our boat must be decked, that was a certainty.

This decision led naturally to the question of one of the principal dimensions—namely, the depth—of the proposed craft. She must be deep enough under her deck at least to allow her occupants to lie down and sleep in comfort. After careful consideration we fixed the depth at five feet in the clear. With that as a ruling dimension it was not difficult to decide that a suitable beam or breadth would be ten feet. After much consideration we fixed the length at thirty feet on the water-line, which, we decided, would afford sufficient room for ourselves, our immediate and indispensable belongings, and a sufficient supply of food and water to carry us to our journey's end. Taking pencil and paper, we proceeded to draught out the boat, that we might see how she looked, and estimate the quantity of material needed for her construction.

Our first sketch showed the contours of a Thames punt, pure and simple; but when we pictured her in a heavy seaway, and endeavoured to imagine what her behaviour would be under such circumstances, we quickly came to the conclusion that certain modifications were imperative. These we proceeded to make forthwith; the final result being a craft of the dimensions already determined upon, flat-bottomed in cross section, but curved fore and aft, and with enough sheer to lift the fore end of her well above water. Being flat-bottomed, she would naturally be of light draught, and would consequently make a good deal of leeway when close-hauled, unless some special provision could be made to meet the case. We therefore decided to extend her two flat sides nine inches below her bottom, so as to form two keels; and, thus provided, we believed she would prove to be fairly weatherly. She was to be decked all over, with only a small cockpit aft; and light was to be furnished to her interior by four of the glass ports or windows to be removed from the wreck. She was to be sloop-rigged. The completed and finally approved design cost us an afternoon to produce, but when it was done we were very well satisfied with it. We believed that the craft ought to behave fairly well, even in heavy weather; while the design was so simple as to demand no special skill in carrying it out, and such loose timber as we had, supplemented by a certain quantity of deck planking, would be sufficient for our purpose.

The next thing to be done was to proceed with the actual work, and this we did forthwith.

I am not going to inflict upon the patient reader any wearisome details of our work, step by step; I believe they may safely be left to his imagination; moreover, I have other and more interesting things to tell. I will therefore dismiss this part of my story by mentioning that, although the work of building our craft proved to be considerably less easy than we had anticipated, chiefly because of my lack of knowledge of the details of carpentry, we made very fair progress after the first two or three days, and especially after I had acquired the knack of handling a plane properly. But I had to do every stroke of the actual work myself. The women merely helped me by holding the various parts in place while I bored the holes or drove the nails; and Julius positively refused to lend the slightest assistance, because, forsooth, he had not been consulted during the preparation of the plans! He would sit smoking cigarettes and fishing, and watch, unmoved, his mother and sister, to say nothing of the two stewardesses, straining themselves to help me to lift heavy weights and bend the stout bottom planks to the required curve. Also—chiefly, I think, because he knew that I objected—he would persist in shooting at the gulls with a rifle; until at length, in a fit of exasperation, I risked his mother's displeasure and put an end to the wastage by locking up the ammunition and taking possession of the key.

I have already mentioned the arrangement which we had made in the matter of night watches. This, of course, only applied to those nights when the moon afforded light enough to permit a passing ship to be seen. My instructions were that, in the event of a sail being sighted, I was to be called at once, when I would decide as to the advisability or otherwise of making a flare to attract the attention of her crew. I was quite prepared to receive Master Julius's refusal to participate in these night watches, but, strangely enough, he did not; and thereby hangs a tale.

The watches had been established a month or more, and no sail had been seen. Then, on a certain morning, when Julius called me at three o'clock—my watch followed his—I went on deck and, to my amazement, discovered the flare which I had prepared to serve as a signal blazing brilliantly, having evidently been lighted for quite a quarter of an hour. The full moon was hanging high in a cloudless sky, and the stars were shining with their usual tropical brilliance, but so bright was the light of the flames that I could see nothing outside the rail of the wreck. I therefore descended to the boy's cabin, and, entering without ceremony, demanded to be informed of his reason for lighting the fire.

"Because I saw a ship," he replied.

"Saw a ship!" I repeated. "Then why did you not at once come down and call me? You surely cannot have forgotten that I made it clearly understood I was to be called if a ship should heave in sight, and that nobody was to light the fire without first consulting me?"

To this there was no reply, the lad merely lying in his bed and scowling sulkily at me. I repeated the question in a slightly different form.

"Naw," he answered at length, "I didn't forget. But I guess it's about time that you understood I ain't going to take any orders from you."

"But," I remonstrated, "your mother has given me full power to act as I think best, under all circumstances. I presume that, young as you are, you have sense enough to understand that in any community, however small, there must be a leader whom all the rest must obey. Under no circumstances is this more imperative than in such a case as ours. You surely do not consider that you should be our head and leader, do you?"

"You bet I do," was his amazing reply. "Anyhow," he continued, "I'm not going to obey you, Mister Britisher, so you may clear out and leave me to have my sleep. And see here, since you don't like the way I keep watch, I won't do it any more. Now, git!"

I "got" with some precipitation, lest I should lose my grip upon myself and give the youth the trouncing that he so richly deserved. I desired above all things to avoid that, for I knew that nothing would distress his mother so much as that her darling should be chastised, though ever so lightly.

Returning to the deck, I found the fire still blazing high, for, not content with merely kindling the flare, Master Julius had taken the trouble to fling the whole of our reserve stock of fuel upon it. There was the merest breathing of wind out from the eastward, and this fanned the smoke right along our deck. It made my eyes smart to such an extent that I was compelled to get down off the poop and shelter myself under the break of it, but even here, out of direct range of the glare, I found it impossible to see anything outboard, the mere reflection of the flames being bright enough to dazzle me.

I awaited the coming of daylight, and the appearance of the alleged ship, with the utmost eagerness, not altogether unmingled with anxiety. On the beach of one of the islands which we had visited shortly before the wreck of the yacht, I had observed the ribs of what had once been a fine ship; and the Scotsman who had taken up his abode on the island as a trader in copra and shell had told me a grisly story concerning that ship, which had haunted my memory from the moment when I had awakened to find the Stella Maris piled up on the coral reef. That story was to the effect that the ship had one morning been sighted ashore on the beach, apparently undamaged, but with no sign of a crew aboard her; and when the Scotsman at length succeeded in boarding her, he had found twenty-three corpses lying about her decks in a state of putrefaction that rendered the craft a veritable pest-house and precluded all possibility of close examination. But the deck and bulwarks were so abundantly smeared and bespattered with dry blood as to point unmistakably to the fact of a general slaughter of the crew; while the open hatches and the state of the cargo showed that the ship had been pretty effectually plundered.

My informant added that, while such cases were rare, there was reason for believing that the adjacent seas were haunted by certain individuals who made it their business to hunt for wrecks for the sake of what could be salved from them, and were not above perpetrating a little piracy when the conditions were favourable.

It was the memory of this story that had caused me to give such explicit instructions, that I was to be informed of the presence of a stranger in our neighbourhood before making our plight known by the ignition of the flare. The unruly youngster had wilfully disobeyed me, with the result that, for all he or I knew to the contrary, the attentions of a band of ruthless outlaws or bloodthirsty pirates had possibly been invited. I could only hope that this might not be the case, and that the stranger, if stranger there really was, would prove to be honest; but I was by no means easy in my mind about it.

When one's imagination becomes obsessed by an unpleasant idea there is a natural tendency for anxiety to grow while one is held in suspense; at all events it was so with me on that particular occasion, for it seemed to me that daylight would never come. Meanwhile, however, our flare, after blazing fiercely for a full half-hour, gradually died down and finally burned itself out; and I made no attempt to replenish it, for I knew that, whatever the result might be, its work was effectually done. All that remained was to await the result as patiently as might be.

As soon as the flames had died down sufficiently to allow of my seeing anything, I got the ship's night glass and diligently searched the entire horizon with it, and presently picked up something that gradually resolved itself into a craft which, from its stunted rig, I set down in my own mind as a junk. With the solitary exception, perhaps, of a Malay proa, a Chinese junk was the very last kind of craft that, under the circumstances, I desired to see. While of course it is by no means the case that every Chinese junk carries a pirate crew, the Chinese generally, and especially Chinese seamen, are regarded by Europeans with a certain measure of dubiety as possessing a code of morals peculiarly their own, and of such a character that I, for one, would hesitate long before placing myself and, still more, my companions in their hands and at their mercy. Still, there was nothing for it now but to wait and see how matters would turn out.

When I first saw her, the doubtful craft was in the south-western board, some seven miles distant, heading to the southward, apparently close-hauled, and moving very slowly. As I have said, the wind was a mere breathing; and although the moon was now well down in the western sky and the stranger's sails were in shadow, there was a certain indefinable something in their appearance which told me that they were wrinkling and collapsing with every heave of the swell. I kept the telescope bearing steadily upon her, for she was drawing down toward that part of the sea which was shimmering in liquid silver under the moon's rays, and I knew that when she reached that radiant path I should get a clean, sharply-cut silhouette of her and be able to determine her exact character with some certainty. As luck would have it, however, she tacked before reaching the moon's track, and I was still left in a state of some doubt, although doubt was fast giving way to apprehension. In any case, unless the breeze should freshen, which it might with the coming of the dawn, several hours must elapse before the stranger could arrive at the reef, if she was making for it, as seemed certain.

At length, after what appeared to me an interminable period of suspense, the blackness of the eastern sky melted into a pallor that spread along the horizon even as I watched it, revealing the long, low hummocks of swell slowly heaving in ebony. The lower stars dimmed and vanished as the pallor strengthened and warmed into a delicate primrose tint, spreading to right and left and upward as it did so. Then star after star went out before the advance of the light that turned the indigo of the zenith into purest ultramarine; the primrose hue in the east flushed into orange; a great shaft of white light shot suddenly upward from its midst, and a spark of molten, flaming gold sprang into view, darting a long line of liquid fire across the gently heaving bosom of the sea. The spark grew into a throbbing, palpitating, dazzling blaze; and in an instant it was day: the stars had disappeared, the sky glowed in purest sapphire, the placid ocean laughed under the beams of the triumphant sun. The air, which a few minutes before had carried a sudden touch of chill in it, came warm to the skin, the breeze freshened a trifle; and at length I was able to secure a clear and convincing view of the stranger. She was indeed a junk, as I had surmised; and she was now undoubtedly beating up toward the reef. But for that headstrong boy's wilful disobedience of my instructions, she might have held on upon her original course and by this time been hull-down, with the wreck out of sight from her deck.

There was now no possibility of our evading a visit from her crew; but, thank goodness! there would be ample time to prepare for that visit. I reckoned that unless the breeze continued to freshen, she could not possibly reach us in less than six or seven hours. The question with me was, what sort of reception were we to give her when at length she should arrive? There was, of course, the possibility that her crew might be just plain, honest traders. In that case we might regard ourselves as rescued from our imprisonment on the reef; and, having regard to the precariousness of our situation on a wreck that would perhaps go to pieces in the next gale—which might spring up at any moment—it was important, especially for the women folk, that no chance of rescue should be let slip.

The junk might be heading for us in response to one of the many urgent calls for succour which we had sent out sealed up in empty bottles. My spirits rose a little at the thought, only to sink again at the reflection which succeeded it. It was in the highest degree improbable, if perchance one of our messages should fall into the hands of a Chinese seaman, that he would be able to comprehend and act upon it.

It was a rather perplexing problem for a young fellow like myself to be confronted with; but the decision at which I ultimately arrived was that, while recognising the possibility of the junk's crew being friends, it would be wise to be prepared to meet them as enemies. Having come to this decision, I went below and called the stewardesses, who, since the wreck, had assumed charge of the domestic arrangements— Susie, the second stewardess, proving herself to be a past mistress of the culinary art.

I allowed the others to sleep on, for there was no reason why I should prematurely awaken Mrs Vansittart, only perhaps to worry her needlessly by pouring into her ears the tale of my doubts and fears; but at eight o'clock she and her daughter came on deck, and caught me watching the slowly moving junk, with the telescope glued to my eye. They looked, and an exclamation of delight burst from their lips, to be instantly followed by a demand from Mrs Vansittart why I had not at once called her to impart the good news. Of course I had to explain at length to them the uncertain state of mind under which I was labouring, as already indicated.

"But you fired the flare, Mr Leigh," exclaimed Anthea, pointing to the frame on the poop, from which a thin haze of smoke still arose. "Why did you do that if you felt uncertain as to the character of that junk?"

"No," I said, "your brother did that, on his own responsibility; and he, if anybody, must bear the blame. I am sorry that he did it, because if that junk is indeed coming in response to our call for help, we may be sure that there is somebody aboard her who is navigator enough to find his way to the reef without the need of a special signal from us. Whereas if it be, as I am somewhat disposed to fear—"

"There may be a fight before us—I suppose that is what you mean," interposed Mrs Vansittart. "Oh, well," she continued, "we have plenty of weapons and ammunition, and are not afraid of a few Chinamen. I am sure the dear boy did what he considered the proper thing—"

"Oh, Momma," cut in Anthea, "for goodness gracious sake don't talk such foolishness. It was a stupid, a wrong thing to do, after Mr Leigh had given explicit orders that—"

"It was, was it? Then you take that, and just mind your own business!" exclaimed a well-known quarrelsome voice behind us, and the next instant Master Julius, who had crept up noiselessly behind us in his rubber-soled deck shoes, smote his sister a resounding box on the ear.

As a rule I am a most placid-tempered person, but somehow that blow instantly aroused in me a fury that made me "see red" for a moment. Wheeling sharply, I seized the boy by the scruff of the neck and shook him until his teeth fairly rattled in his head.

"You young ruffian!" I exclaimed, "how dare you strike your sister? You deserve a downright good thrashing for such a deed, and—mark you this, boy!—if ever you so much as attempt to do such a thing again and I get to hear of it, I will rope's-end you until you can neither stand, sit, nor lie down. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!" And I flung him from me with such violence that he went staggering along the deck for three or four yards before he recovered himself.

Of course there was at once a pretty to-do. Anthea was crying—more, I think, at the mortification of being struck than for any other reason; while Mrs Vansittart instantly went into violent hysterics, shrieking that her darling boy was being murdered. The young gentleman himself meanwhile slunk away down the companion stairs, eyeing me as he went, as though by no means certain that I would not yet fall upon him and inflict the punishment that he must have known he richly deserved. Then up rushed the two stewardesses, in response to Mrs Vansittart's shrieks, and between them and Anthea she was piloted below, and, it is to be presumed, ministered to and restored, for the shrieks and outcries presently died away.

About half an hour afterward Lizette, the head stewardess, summoned me to breakfast, at the same time explaining that Mrs Vansittart was taking the meal in her own room, with Julius.

"She is dr-r-readfully angree with you, Monsieur Leigh," the girl informed me; "but do not you care. It is time that somebody should take that boy in hand. He is everey day growing more execr-r-rable!"



CHAPTER TWELVE.

THE CONVERSION OF JULIUS.

When I went down to breakfast, Anthea and Lizette were already in the dining-room. The former had quite recovered her composure, although her eyelids were still a trifle red and swollen, while her small, beautifully-shaped ear was crimson from the force of the blow which it had received. I have already mentioned that this young lady's attitude toward me had completely changed from the moment when I saved her brother's life; her frosty and almost insolent aloofness had entirely disappeared, giving place to a frank and cordial friendliness of disposition rivalling that of her mother, which I admit was mightily agreeable to me. In short, I believed her to be intensely grateful for what I had done on that occasion, and perfectly willing that I should know it. So now I was not at all surprised when, upon my entrance, she came forward and, laying her hand upon my arm, said:

"Oh! Mr Leigh, I cannot tell you how dreadfully sorry I am for what has happened. Momma is frightfully angry with you for what she is pleased to term your violent and cowardly behaviour to Julius—they are her words, please remember, not mine: but I think, indeed I am almost certain, that upon reflection she will recognise that no man could stand by and permit to pass, unreproved, such an outrage as that wretched boy inflicted upon me. The fact is—I can see it for myself now—we have all combined together to spoil Julius, with the result that he has become a thoroughly selfish, conceited, unfeeling, unmanageable boy; and it is high time that somebody should intervene. But that somebody must not be you, Mr Leigh; you have no right to interfere, you know, and I am sure that Momma would never tolerate anything of the kind from you.

"At the same time I feel impelled to say,"—and here her eyes sparkled and an amused smile lighted up her face—"that I believe your interference has done Julius good. You frightened him, and I think he will feel that henceforth he will have to behave a little more circumspectly while you are around. But I want you, please, to promise me that you will not interfere with him again. I will take up the matter. I will talk very seriously to Momma and see if I cannot open her eyes to the very serious wrong and injury that we are all doing to the boy by petting and pampering him, and humouring his every whim, however outrageous it may be. So you will give me your promise to be very patient with him, won't you? I know that he has been atrociously rude and provocative to you, but—"

"Please say no more," I interrupted. "I think I may safely promise you that no rudeness or provocation on his part, levelled at me personally, shall be allowed to move me in the slightest degree. But if ever the young monkey again dares to lift his hand against you in my presence, I'll—I'll—"

"Yes, yes, I know; you needn't say it," she interrupted in turn, and once more her eyes sparkled with merriment; "it will be something too awful for words. Well, I'll tell Julius what you say, and perhaps the information may have a good effect upon him. And now let us to breakfast, for I see Lizette is in a perfect terror lest the coffee should be allowed to go cold."

We sat down to breakfast opposite each other and chatted more merrily and intimately together than we had ever done before. But when the meal was over we put merriment aside, for there was the approaching junk to be thought of and provided for. When we rose from the table I requested Anthea to procure from her mother the keys of the magazine and bring them to me, as I proposed to make every possible provision for the defence of the wreck, should such unhappily prove to be necessary. And while she went to her mother for the required keys, I made my way up on to the poop and took another look at the junk.

There she was, close-hauled on the port tack, and evidently working up for the reef. But she was a slow tub, and the breeze was still so light that her sails barely remained "asleep" as she heaved and rolled ponderously upon the long, low, Pacific swell. I plainly saw that I should have ample time for such preparations as it would be possible to make for her reception.

I flung a look round the horizon and searched the sky for weather signs. The sky was clear as a bell, of a deep, rich, ultramarine tint in the zenith; shading off by imperceptible gradations to a soft, warm colourlessness at the horizon. There was not the slightest hint of haze or cloud in the whole of the visible vault, and the breeze was a mere warm breathing, with nothing to indicate that it might possibly freshen. Would that it would fall calm before the junk could enter the lagoon! In that case we should be able to judge of her friendliness or otherwise by the number of boats which she would dispatch to us. I went to the flag locker, drew forth our Club ensign, and ran it up, reversed, to the head of the ensign staff—which, for a wonder, had escaped the general destruction—in the hope that this would evoke some sort of response from the crew of the junk, to serve in some measure as a guide to me. I had just belayed the halyards when Anthea came to me with the keys.

She glanced from me to the flag and back again, questioningly, and I explained.

"I see," she said. "Very well; here are the keys, but I do hope it will not be necessary to fight. I remember the Malacca Straits affair, when we had the entire crew to help us in defending the ship. Do you think that, situated as we now are, we should have any chance?"

"I don't see why not," I replied. "Although we are a wreck we can still show a rather formidable set of teeth,"—waving my hand toward the main-deck guns—"to say nothing of the two Maxims, upon which I shall principally pin my faith. The only thing that we must guard against is letting the rascals get too close before plainly declaring their intentions. But that should not be difficult."

"Supposing they are enemies, and should beat us, what do you think our fate would be?" demanded the girl, coming close to me and laying her hand upon my arm in the earnestness of her questioning.

I drew in my breath sharply at the mere suggestion. "They must not be allowed to beat us," I exclaimed harshly. "Such a possibility will not bear thinking of."

"Ah! I understand. So you think it might be as bad as that," returned my companion; and I saw the colour ebb from her cheeks and lips, leaving them white as marble, while her fingers closed like a vice upon my arm. "But if you should be hurt," she continued, "what would happen then?"

"It mustn't happen," I exclaimed; "it mustn't! I must take precautions of some sort to provide against such a possibility."

"Of course," she eagerly agreed. "But, supposing that in spite of your precautions you should be hurt—or killed,"—she shivered violently—"what then?"

"I will tell you," I said, seizing both her hands in mine and crushing them, I fear, in the passion of horror which her persistence conjured up. "I will give you, your mother, and the stewardesses a revolver each, and if by evil chance that junk should prove to be an enemy, and should get the upper hand of us, you must shoot yourselves, rather than fall alive into the hands of the Chinamen! Of course you need not take such a desperate step until the very last moment, when it has become evident that escape is impossible; but when that moment arrives—do you think you will have the courage to do as I say?"