the boat
that carried her had turned rapidly away from the Ithaca. His one
thought now was to rescue her from her abductors and return her to her
father. Of his own reward or profit he entertained no single
thought--it was enough if he could fight for her. That would be reward
sufficient.

Neither Number Thirteen nor any of his crew had ever before seen a
boat, and outside of the leader there was scarcely enough brains in the
entire party to render it at all likely that they could ever navigate
it, but the young man saw that the other prahus were being propelled by
the long sticks which protruded from their sides, and he also saw the
sails bellying with wind, though he had but a vague conception of their
purpose.

For a moment he stood watching the actions of the men in the nearest
boat, and then he set himself to the task of placing his own men at the
oars and instructing them in the manner of wielding the unfamiliar
implements. For an hour he worked with the brainless things that
constituted his party. They could not seem to learn what was required
of them. The paddles were continually fouling one another, or being
merely dipped into the water and withdrawn without the faintest
semblance of a stroke made.

The tiresome maneuvering had carried them about in circles back and
forth across the harbor, but by it Number Thirteen had himself learned
something of the proper method of propelling and steering his craft.
At last, more through accident than intent, they came opposite the
mouth of the basin, and then chance did for them what days of arduous
endeavor upon their part might have failed to accomplish.

As they hung wavering in the opening, the broad strait before them, and
their quarry fast diminishing to small specks upon the distant horizon,
a vagrant land breeze suddenly bellied the flapping sail. The prahu
swung quickly about with nose pointed toward the sea, the sail filled,
and the long, narrow craft shot out of the harbor and sped on over the
dancing waters in the wake of her sisters.

On shore behind them the infuriated Dyaks who had escaped to the beach
danced and shrieked; von Horn, from his hiding place, looked on in
surprised wonder, and Bududreen's lascar cursed the fate that had left
a party of forty head hunters upon the same small island with him.

Smaller and smaller grew the retreating prahu as, straight as an arrow,
she sped toward the dim outline of verdure clad Borneo.

9

IN