g for us."

"Yes, Captain Barry," rejoined Vandersee, with his old suave smile, "and
I owe you some explanation before we leave. If you will get the schooner
ready, it will give the ladies time to recover a little, and when my
sister is herself again, everything shall be made clear to you which
appears puzzling now."

"Your sister?" exclaimed Barry.

"Yes, Captain, Mrs. Goring as you know her, or Miss Vandersee as she is,
is my sister. Mr. Houten is our uncle, also. Perhaps you will connect
things slightly now, by the time we are ready," replied Vandersee,
while Cornelius Houten chuckled deep down in his cavernous chest and
shot a twinkle from his beady eyes at the astonished skipper.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Barry's thoughts kept him busy along with his duties for half an hour,
by which time the schooner had taken up her boat, and a general transfer
of men had been accomplished. The big pinnace, which belonged to the
invisible gunboat, took on board the Dutch seamen and the survivors of
Leyden's band, leaving the _Barang's_ crew under Rolfe and Blunt on
board the schooner with Barry. Tom Little was in close conversation with
Houten, and Gordon stood by as if quietly awaiting the outcome of it.
Old Bill Blunt was forward, making the decks rattle with his lusty roar
as he drove the little brown sailors to their jobs of preparing for sea.
Outwardly the old fellow had managed to keep intact; it was only when he
cut himself a quid of tobacco by jamming the plug into the sheave of a
block and sawing at it with one hand that it could be noticed his left
hand never left his belt and that his sleeve was dark and soggy.

Mrs. Goring and Natalie Sheldon appeared on deck while Little and Houten
were still talking, and they had regained their color and self-control,
only revealing a slight shudder of recollection when their eyes fell
upon the devastated creek. Houten noticed this and cut short his
consultation.

"So, dot iss settled, Mister Leedle," he said abruptly and met the
ladies with a vast and paternal smile. "Captain Barry, when dot launch I
had comes back from dot gunboat, we schall sail. Mister Leedle has
agreed to go back to the station unt take charge until Mister Gordon
returns, unt he takes dot launch unt some navy mans to stay mit him in
case dose leedle brown mans ouf Leyden's make more bodder. So now mine
boy Hendrik schall tell you somedings, yes?"

Barry kept silent, merely nodding. Vandersee spoke