a "monkey's sleep" when he was awakened by a
hail from Atkins.

"What's the matter, Atkins?" cried Oliver.

"We're all right, sir; but Miss Remington has just come to, and is
asking for Mr. Carr, so I said I'd hail you just to show her that he is
with you. Better let me come alongside."

Oliver looked at Harvey with something like a smile in his eyes.

"All right, Atkins," he replied, and then to Harvey, "Here, wake up
young-fellow-my-lad, and get into the other boat with your sweetheart. I
don't want you here. What's the use of you if you haven't even a bit of
tobacco to give me?"

The second mate's boat drew alongside, and in another minute Harvey was
seated in the stern sheets with Tessa's cheek against his own, and her
arms round his neck.

"Any of you fellows got any tobacco, and a pipe to spare?" said the
prosaic Oliver. "If you haven't, sheer off."

"Lashings of everything," said Atkins.

"Here you are: two pipes, matches, bottle of Jimmy Hennessy, and some
water and biscuits. What more can you want? Who wouldn't sell a farm and
go to sea?"

CHAPTER VI

At sunrise the three boats were all within a half-mile of each other,
floating upon a smooth sea of the deepest blue. Overhead the vault of
heaven was unflecked by a single cloud, though far away on the eastern
sea-rim a faintly curling bank gave promise of a breeze before the sun
rose much higher.

At a signal from Oliver the second mate pulled up, and he, Harvey, and
the chief mate again held a brief consultation. Then Harvey went back to
Oliver, and both boats came together, rowing in company alongside
that of the captain's, no one speaking, and all feeling that sense of
something impending, born of a sudden silence.

The captain's boat was steered by Huka, the Savage Islander; Hendry
himself was sitting beside Chard in the stern sheets, Morrison and
Studdert amidships amidst the native crew, whose faces were sullen and
lowering, for in the bottom of the boat one of their number, who had
been shot in the stomach by either the captain or Chard, was dying.

Hendry's always forbidding face was even more lowering than usual as his
eyes turned upon the chief officer. Chard, whose head was bound up in
a bloodstained handkerchief, smiled in his frank, jovial manner as
he rose, lifted his cap to Tessa, and nodded pleasantly to Oliver and
Harvey.

"What are your orders, sir?" asked the chief mate addressing the
captain.

Hendry gave him a loo