rned from the rail, where he had stood
while speaking to Frank. "We can't help you, boy. Sorry, but we can't,
if it's yellow fever you have on board."

And, to Frank's unspeakable amazement, the bark was instantly put about,
and was soon rapidly widening the distance between him and safety.

He had not thought of the dread pestilence the Sea Eagle carried in her
every rope and spar and sail.

For a moment he felt as if he should die, so great was the reaction from
eager hope and joy to bitterest disappointment and despair; but he
rallied his sinking heart, after a little, and watched the bark
disappear in the sun lit distance, with strangely-bright and tearless
eyes.

[Illustration:
"FRANK WORKED UNCEASINGLY UNTIL NEAR SUNSET."]

No one could, no one dared, to help him, when they knew it was yellow
fever that menaced them, and tainted the very air through which the Sea
Eagle sailed. He no longer need look for relief by means of a passing
vessel. That hope was gone utterly; for it would be wicked and cruel not
to tell of what it was the captain had died. And who would aid him, when
they knew it was to risk their life to do so?

Yellow fever, and with good reason, is only another name for death to a
sailor, and Frank could not blame them for giving the schooner a wide
berth.

When the Swallow was quite out of sight, he returned to his seat under
the awning. It was now almost sunset, and the haze and mist of early
twilight began to creep over the tossing waves.

For the first time since he was left alone on the vessel, he sat himself
down to calmly think over the terrifying position in which he was placed
and gravely consider what it was best for him to do.

He had passed through all there was, he thought, of sorrow, dismay,
disappointment and horror; and whatever there might be of suffering and
danger in store for him, he felt that, at most, they could give him no
greater pain than he had already endured.

The reflection somehow was as comforting as it was sudden and startling
to his weary energies and overtaxed strength. He would not give up
again, and, from that moment, resolved to save both the vessel and
himself, if he could.

Captain Thorne, when predicting his own speedy death, had spoken as if
he thought Frank would live to reach land; and in this belief he had
died, after giving into the lad's keeping his little all of wealth and
telling him what to do in case he survived the perils of this most
per