g of the sort. He lay flat
and still until his rescuers were at a safe height. Then he sat up and
smiled radiantly at them. "Ladies, I thank you," he said.

"And I'll see that you get a Carnegie medal if it takes the rest of my
life. I guess," he remarked unabashed, as his companions joined him, "it
will be fresh-water swimming for your little friend hereafter."

Nobody spoke for a while. His companions were still white and Billy
Fairfax even shook.

"You looked like an engraving that used to hang over my bed when I was a
child," said Ralph, with an attempt at humor that had, coming from him,
a touching quality, "a bunch of, angels lugging a dead man to heaven.
You'd have been a ringer for it if you'd had a shave."

"Well, the next time the girls come, I'm going to swim out among the
pretty sharks," said Pete, obviously trying to echo Ralph's light note.
"By Jove, hear them chatter up there. They're talking all at once and at
the top of their lungs just like your sisters and your cousins and your
aunts."

"They're as pale as death, too," observed Billy. "Look at that!"

The flying-maidens had come together in a compact circular group, hands
over each other's shoulders, wings faintly fluttering. Perceptibly they
clung to each other for support. Their faces had turned chalky; their
heads drooped. Intertwined thus, they drifted out of sight.

"Lord, they are beautiful, close-to!" Honey said. "You never saw such
complexions! Or such eyes and teeth! And--and--by George, such an effect
of purity and stainlessness. I feel like a--and yet, by--." He fell
into an abstraction so deep that it was as though he had forgotten his
companions.

For several days, the girls did not appear on Angel Island. All
that time, the capture argument lay in abeyance. Even Ralph, who had
introduced the project, seemed touched by the gallantry of Honey's
rescue. Honey, himself, was strangely subdued; his eternal monologue
had dried up; he seemed preoccupied. Nevertheless, it was he, who, one
night, reopened the discussion with a defiant flat: "Well, boys, I might
as well tell you, I've swung over to Ralph's side. I'm for the capture
of those girls, and capture as soon as we can make it."

"Well, I'll be--" said Billy. "After they saved your life! Honey, I
guess I don't know you any more."

"What's changed you?" Pete asked in amazement.

"Can't tell you why--don't know myself why when you get the answer tell
me. Only in the ten minutes t