he
first desperate struggle to escape from the clutch of the typhoon. Iris
would not be content until the sailor showed her the rock behind which
he placed her for shelter whilst he searched for water. For a moment
the recollection of their unfortunate companions on board ship brought
a lump into her throat and dimmed her eyes.

"I remember them in my prayers every night," she confided to him. "It
seems so unutterably sad that they should be lost, whilst we are alive
and happy."

The man distracted her attention by pointing out the embers of their
first fire. It was the only way to choke back the tumultuous feelings
that suddenly stormed his heart. Happy! Yes, he had never before known
such happiness. How long would it last? High up on the cliff swung the
signal to anxious searchers of the sea that here would be found the
survivors of the _Sirdar_. And then, when rescue came, when Miss
Deane became once more the daughter of a wealthy baronet, and he a
disgraced and a nameless outcast--! He set his teeth and savagely
struck at a full cup of the pitcher-plant which had so providentially
relieved their killing thirst.

"Oh, why did you do that?" pouted Iris. "Poor thing! it was a true
friend in need. I wish I could do something for it to make it the best
and leafiest plant of its kind on the island."

"Very well!" he answered; "you can gratify your wish. A tinful of fresh
water from the well, applied daily to its roots, will quickly achieve
that end."

The moroseness of his tone and manner surprised her. For once her quick
intuition failed to divine the source of his irritation.

"You give your advice ungraciously," she said, "but I will adopt it
nevertheless."

A harmless incident, a kindly and quite feminine resolve, yet big with
fate for both of them.

Jenks's unwonted ill-humor--for the passage of days had driven from his
face all its harshness, and from his tongue all its assumed
bitterness--created a passing cloud until the physical exertion of
scrambling over the rocks to round the North Cape restored their normal
relations.

A strong current raced by this point to the south-east, and tore away
the outlying spur of the headland to such an extent that the sailor was
almost inclined to choose the easier way through the trees. Yet he
persevered, and it may be confessed that the opportunities thus
afforded of grasping the girl's arm, of placing a steadying hand on her
shoulder, were dominant factors in dete