acts.

"Not much of a chance to save anything but the motor and the shaft,"
Dickie observed. "And we'll have to work lively to do that on this ebb.
She'll break up on the flood if there's any sea."

As Howard jerked his head in acquiescence with the girl's diagnosis, a
shower of loose rocks rattled from the overhanging cliff. Dickie walked
around the _Petrel's_ bow and scrambled to the ledge.

"Looks as if we were going to have company," she announced, pointing in
the direction of the bluff, where three men were descending the trail to
the beach. Reaching the ledge the strangers walked steadily toward the
wreck and halted within a few feet of the salvage party. As they
jabbered in a French dialect, Gregory listened intently.

Dickie's hand stole to the pocket of her coat. The men seemed bent on
making trouble. It was best to take no chances. Her fingers sought the
handle of the Colt in vain. Cursing her negligence in leaving the
automatic aboard the _Pelican_, she stepped forward for a parley with
the strangers. Gregory and Howard placed themselves about her as the men
moved closer.

"No sabe," exclaimed Dickie Lang. "What kind of lingo are they talking
anyway."

Gregory was dividing his attention between the man with the red beard
and the weasel-faced stranger who was gesticulating so wildly with his
long arms.

"Red-beard says nobody's allowed here, or words to that effect," he
interpreted. "Weasel-face backs him up in it and says for us to beat
it."

"Tell them what we're here for. And that when we get the boat stripped
we'll go, and not before."

The red-bearded man shook his heavy head with slow comprehension.
Weasel-face shuffled closer, his small eyes blinking malevolently. The
third member of the party, a thick-set man with a face pitted by scars,
motioned threateningly in the direction of the dory.

Dickie brushed forward.

"I'll try them in dago," she said.

Gregory watched the strangers move closer to their leader as the girl
began to speak; heard his low-voiced words, uttered in a harsh guttural;
saw his arm flash out and grasp the girl roughly by the shoulder.

Leaping forward, Gregory found his way blocked by Weasel-face. The
islander's hand was fumbling at his belt. Gregory's fist snapped his
head backward. The man's hands flew up, but not in time to block the
vicious blow which caught him full on the chin.

Weasel-face's legs collapsed. Without a sound he fell in a heap upon the
rocks.