the darky handling the sheet of a small, much patched sail,
kept himself comparatively dry. But Mr. Heatherbloom didn't seem to mind
the drenching; though the briny drops stung his cheek, his face
continued ever bent forward, toward a point of land to the right of
which lay the island that came ever nearer, but slowly--so slowly!

He could see the top of the spars of a vessel now over the high
sand-hills; his body bent toward it; in his eyes shone a steely light.
Their little boat drew closer to the near side of the island; the
hillocks stood up higher; the tapering topmasts of the craft on the
other side disappeared. The crabber's cockle-shell came to anchor in a
tranquil sandy cove.

Mr. Heatherbloom, although inwardly chafing, felt obliged to restrain
impatience; he could not afford to awaken the darky's suspicions,
therefore he simulated interest and--"crabbed". He enjoyed a streak of
good luck, but his artificial enthusiasm soon waned. He at length
suggested trying the other side of the island, whereupon his pilot
expostulated.

What more did his passenger want? The latter thought he would stretch
his legs a bit on the shore; it made him stiff to sit still so long. He
would get out and walk around--he had a predilection for deserted
islands. While he was gratifying his fancy the darky could return to his
more remunerative business of gathering in the denizens of the deep.

Five minutes later Mr. Heatherbloom stood on the sandy beach; he started
as if to walk around the island but had not gone far before he turned
and moved at a right angle up over the sand-hill. The dull-hued bushes
that somehow found nourishment on the yellow mound now concealed his
figure from the boatman; the same hardy vegetation afforded him a
shelter from the too inquisitive gaze of any persons on the yacht when
he had gained the summit of the sands.

There, he peered through the leaves down upon a beautiful vessel. She
lay near the shore; whatever her injury, it seemed to have been repaired
by this time for few signs of life were apparent on or about her. Steam
was up; a faint dun-colored smoke swept, pennon-like, from her white
funnels. Some one was inspecting her stern from a platform swung over
the rail, and to Mr. Heatherbloom's strained vision this person's
interest, or concern, centered in the mechanism of her rudder. The
trouble had been there no doubt, and if so, the yacht had probably come,
or been brought near the island at h