ceased; by an odd but
not quite unnatural conjunction, the captain's soothing current of talk
died away at the same time and by proportional steps, and the pair
remained sunk in silence. The lagoon broke at their feet in petty
wavelets, and with a sound as delicate as a whisper; stars of all
degrees looked down on their own images in that vast mirror; and the
more angry colour of the _Farallone's_ riding lamp burned in the middle
distance. For long they continued to gaze on the scene before them, and
hearken anxiously to the rustle and tinkle of that miniature surf, or
the more distant and loud reverberations from the outer coast. For long
speech was denied them; and when the words came at last, they came to
both simultaneously.

"Say, Herrick ..." the captain was beginning.

But Herrick, turning swiftly towards his companion, bent him down with
the eager cry: "Let's up anchor, captain, and to sea!"

"Where to, my son?" said the captain. "Up anchor's easy saying. But
where to?"

"To sea," responded Herrick. "The sea's big enough! To sea--away from
this dreadful island and that, O! that sinister man!"

"O, we'll see about that," said Davis. "You brace up, and we'll see
about that. You're all run down, that's what's wrong with you; you're
all nerves, like Jemimar; you've got to brace up good and be yourself
again, and then we'll talk."

"To sea," reiterated Herrick, "to sea to-night--now--this moment!"

"It can't be, my son," replied the captain firmly. "No ship of mine puts
to sea without provisions; you can take that for settled."

"You don't seem to understand," said Herrick. "The whole thing is over,
I tell you. There is nothing to do here, when he knows all. That man
there with the cat knows all; can't you take it in?"

"All what?" asked the captain, visibly discomposed. "Why, he received us
like a perfect gentleman and treated us real handsome, until you began
with your foolery--and I must say I seen men shot for less, and nobody
sorry! What more do you expect anyway?"

Herrick rocked to and fro upon the sand, shaking his head.

"Guying us," he said; "he was guying us--only guying us; it's all we're
good for."

"There was one queer thing, to be sure," admitted the captain, with a
misgiving of the voice; "that about the sherry. Damned if I caught on
to that. Say, Herrick, you didn't give me away?"

"O! give you away!" repeated Herrick with weary, querulous scorn. "What
was there to give away? We're tr