distant horizon. But
disappointment always awaited her. There was nothing in every direction
but dreary, monotonous wastes of heaving water, the boisterous waves
dancing in the sunlight as if to mock her misery.

The care of keeping this signal-fire going devolved on Armitage, and it
was the day's most important task. The fire was kept banked with damped
moss and peat in the daytime, so it would throw off a smoke thick enough
to be visible miles away at sea. At night it was made to blaze furiously
with the same object in view.

The cave had been deserted long ago. The day following her horrible
experience with the serpent, Grace protested hysterically that nothing
could induce her to enter the gloomy place again. Sleeping in it, she
declared, was utterly out of the question. The cobra was dead, but there
was no telling what other reptile as venomous and deadly might again
crawl out of the cave's countless holes and recesses. Armitage admitted
the possibility, and at once offered to build a cabin for her in the
open. It would be far more healthy and comfortable.

She gladly consented, and he went to work with a will. He had no tools,
and his construction materials were necessarily of the most primitive
character. Happily, the weather continued fine, and, while her new home
was in the building, Grace managed as best she could under a temporary
shelter.

Selecting a site that was high and dry, Armitage first dug a square hole
in the ground three feet deep by about fourteen feet in length and
breadth. Each side of the excavation he lined with stone walls made of
huge boulders piled one on top of another, and decreasing in weight and
size until they reached a height all round of nearly nine feet. The
interstices he filled with clay to keep out the wind and rain, and
additional strength was secured for the walls by banking up earth on all
four exterior sides. It was a herculean task, for each of the big, heavy
stones had to be dragged a considerable distance, and the only implement
he had to dig with was a crude spade which he made out of a piece of
planed wood found among the drift along the shore and sharpened and
hardened in fire. Light entered through a door and window, and then came
the roof. This he made with heavy limbs of trees equally matched, which
rested on top of the stone walls, these in turn being crossed with
smaller branches, and the whole covered with a thick thatch of
tussac-grass and moss held in place