ett.

"That's true, too," assented Ives. "Well, perhaps that volcanic eruption
jarred them so that they jumped for it."

"Pretty wild theory, that," said Edwards.

"No wilder than the facts, as you give them," was the retort.

"That's so," admitted the ensign gloomily.

"But how about pestilence?" suggested Barnett.

"Maybe they died fast and the last survivor, after the bodies of the rest
were overboard, got delirious and jumped after them."

"Not if the galley fire was hot," said Dr. Trendon, briefly. "No;
pestilence doesn't work that way."

"Did you look at the wheel, Billy?" asked Ives.

"Did I! There's another thing. Wheel's all right, but compass is no good
at all. It's regularly bewitched."

"What about the log, then?"

"Couldn't find it anywhere. Hunted high, low, jack, and the game;
everywhere except in the big, brass-bound chest I found in the captain's
cabin. Couldn't break into that."

"Dr. Schermerhorn's chest!" exclaimed Barnett. "Then he was aboard."

"Well, he isn't aboard now," said the ensign grimly. "Not in the flesh.
And that's all," he added suddenly.

"No; it isn't all," said Barnett gently. "There's something else.
Captain's orders?"

"Oh, no. Captain Parkinson doesn't take enough stock in my report to tell
me to withhold anything," said Edwards, with a trace of bitterness in his
voice. "It's nothing that I believe myself, anyhow."

"Give _us_ a chance to believe it," said Ives.

"Well," said the ensign hesitantly, "there's a sort of atmosphere about
that schooner that's almost uncanny."

"Oh, you had the shudders before you were ordered to board," bantered
Ives.

"I know it. I'd have thought it was one of those fool presentiments if I
were the only one to feel it. But the men were affected, too. They kept
together like frightened sheep. And I heard one say to another: 'Hey,
Boney, d'you feel like someone was a-buzzin' your nerves like a
fiddle-string?' Now," demanded Edwards plaintively, "what right has a
jackie to have nerves?"

"That's strange enough about the compass," said Barnett slowly. "Ours is
all right again. The schooner must have been so near the electric
disturbance that her instruments were permanently deranged."

"That would lend weight to the volcanic theory," said Carter.

"So the captain didn't take kindly to your go-look-see?" questioned Ives
of Edwards.

"As good as told me I'd missed the point of the thing," said the ensign,
flushing. "Perhaps he