pletely
around him, and he'll fight as a rat will fight."

Barry covertly watched Natalie while Leyden's rattish characteristics
were under discussion. She showed no agitation; no sign of personal
shame at having ever fallen to such a spell; but at that instant a
shrill whistle sounded upstream, quite near, and she paled, then flushed
hotly, and at last recovered her balance but with a trembling lip.

Then the sound of engines was heard, and on the still river brooded an
atmosphere of imminent Fate. In the devastated creek no sound or sigh
broke the barren stillness. The waters swirled and eddied around the
entrance; the matted grasses and weed-stems writhed and twisted in the
grip of the current like slimy, clutching fingers waiting for prey to
clutch and hold to strangled death. For just one second a man's head
appeared above a clump of blackened roots where Rolfe's party had
landed. Barry saw it was the irrepressible Little bent on seeing the
sights; then a great, gnarled hand shoved the head down, and all was
barren again.

Now the oncoming launch came in sight; the same launch that had carried
Leyden up the river, which Barry had lost track of on that dark night
before he was taken and given to the ants; and she foamed straight down
between the schooner and the creek with creaming bow-wave and flying
funnel-sparks. Leyden was in the bows, jaunty and triumphant; but as he
came near the schooner and saw nobody on her decks, his face clouded,
and he waved to his engineer to stop. Then Barry, from his hastily taken
hiding place, watched Natalie, curious about her part in this crisis.

Stepping over to the rail, she turned her smiling, morning-fresh face
upon the launch and waved her hand airily at Leyden. All Barry's doubts
resurged upon him. He felt choky, and red spots danced before his eyes.
Then in a God-given instant of clarity he saw it all: saw Leyden's own
doubts vanish, and the launch move on to the wreck; and he saw, too,
that Natalie tottered and panted, still fighting bravely to maintain her
attitude in sight of Leyden, yet in dire need of comfort the moment her
friend could render it.

Leyden called back a clear, exultant greeting to the girl, and the next
moment his launch ran alongside the _Barang_ and her bowman made his
boathook fast.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Natalie swayed and would have fallen had not Mrs. Goring run from her
hiding place to catch and support her. Barry recalled Vandersee