ow," he said, addressing us, "I think that we should do
well to try to get out of this place. Eliminating a great deal of the
marvelous with which we seem to have come in touch here, it is
still obvious that we find ourselves in very peculiar and unhealthy
surroundings. I mean mentally unhealthy, indeed I think that if we stay
here much longer we shall probably go off our heads. Now that boat on
the deck remains sound and seaworthy. Why should not we provision her
and take our chance? We know more or less which way to steer."

Bastin and I looked at each other. It was he who spoke first.

"Wouldn't it be rather a risky job in an open boat?" he asked. "However,
that doesn't matter much because I don't take any account of risks,
knowing that I am of more value than a sparrow and that the hairs of my
head are all numbered."

"They might be numbered under water as well as above it," muttered
Bickley, "and I feel sure that on your own showing, you would be as
valuable dead as alive."

"What I seem to feel," went on Bastin, "is that I have work to my hand
here. Also, the locum tenens at Fulcombe no doubt runs the parish as
well as I could. Indeed I consider him a better man for the place than
I am. That old Oro is a tough proposition, but I do not despair of him
yet, and besides him there is the Glittering Lady, a most open-minded
person, whom I have not yet had any real opportunity of approaching in
a spiritual sense. Then there are all these natives who cannot learn
without a teacher. So on the whole I think I would rather stay where I
am until Providence points out some other path."

"I am of the same opinion, if for somewhat different reasons," I said.
"I do not suppose that it has often been the fortune of men to come in
touch with such things as we have found upon this island. They may be
illusions, but at least they are very interesting illusions. One might
live ten lifetimes and find nothing else of the sort. Therefore I should
like to see the end of the dream."

Bickley reflected a little, then said:

"On the whole I agree with you. Only my brain totters and I am terribly
afraid of madness. I cannot believe what I seem to hear and see, and
that way madness lies. It is better to die than to go mad."

"You'll do that anyway when your time comes, Bickley, I mean decease,
of course," interrupted Bastin. "And who knows, perhaps all this is an
opportunity given by Providence to open your eyes, which, I must say,
a