to striking my colours. I had broken orders deliberately
and because I denied his right to give such orders. I might be a
youngster; but, to say the least of it, I had as much interest
in the success of this expedition as any member of the company.
The shortest way to dissuade Captain Branscome from treating me as a
child was to assert myself from the beginning. I had started with
full intent to assert myself, and--yes, I was much obliged to Mr.
Rogers, but this question between me and Branscome had best be
settled, though it meant open mutiny. I felt pretty sure that Miss
Belcher would support the tyrant; almost equally sure that Plinny
would acquiesce, though her sympathy went with me; and strangely
enough, and unjustly, I felt the angrier with Plinny. But even
against Miss Belcher I had a card to play. "Captain Branscome may be
an excellent leader," I would say; "but I beg you to remember that
you gave me no vote in electing him. I will obey any leader I have
my share in choosing, but until then I stand out." And I had an
inkling that, though the public voice would be against me, I should
establish my claim to be taken into any future counsels.

"In for a lamb, in for a sheep," thought I, and began to back the
cockboat towards the corner where the dinghy lay. As I did so it
occurred to me to wonder why the Captain and Mr. Rogers had been so
dilatory. They must have started a full hour ahead of me; they had
left the schooner at a brisk stroke, whereas I had merely floated up
with the tide. Yet either I had all but surprised them in the act of
stepping ashore, or, if they had landed at once, why had Mr. Rogers
loitered on the bank until I was close on overtaking him?

They had landed at the extreme head of the creek. Therefore
(I argued) their intent was to follow up the stream here indicated on
the chart and search for the clump of trees which guarded the secret
of No. 3 _cache_.

Sure enough, having beached my boat alongside the dinghy and climbed
the green knoll above the foreshore, I spied their footprints on the
sandy edge of the stream which here fetched a loop before joining the
tidal waters of the creek. They led me along a flat meadow of
exquisitely green turf, fringed with palmetto-trees, to the entrance
of a narrow gorge through which the stream came tumbling in a series
of cascades, spraying the ferns that overhung it. The forest with
its undergrowth pressed so closely upon either bank that