d longitude, and marked out the
vessel's position on a chart that was pinned on their cabin table. I saw
them at it, and so did the steward from his pantry."

"Well, I don't see what you prove from that," the captain remarked,
"though I confess it is a strange thing."

"I'll tell you another strange thing," said the mate impressively. "Do
you know the name of this bay in which we are cast away?"

"I have learnt from our kind friends here that we are upon the
Wigtownshire coast," the captain answered, "but I have not heard the
name of the bay."

The mate leant forward with a grave face.

"It is the Bay of Kirkmaiden," he said.

If he expected to astonish Captain Meadows he certainly succeeded, for
that gentleman was fairly bereft of speech for a minute or more.

"This is really marvellous," he said, after a time, turning to us.
"These passengers of ours cross-questioned us early in the voyage as
to the existence of a bay of that name. Hawkins here and I denied all
knowledge of one, for on the chart it is included in the Bay of
Luce. That we should eventually be blown into it and destroyed is an
extraordinary coincidence."

"Too extraordinary to be a coincidence," growled the mate. "I saw
them during the calm yesterday morning, pointing to the land over our
starboard quarter. They knew well enough that that was the port they
were making for."

"What do you make of it all, then, Hawkins?" asked the captain, with a
troubled face. "What is your own theory on the matter?"

"Why, in my opinion," the mate answered, "them three swabs have no more
difficulty in raising a gale o' wind than I should have in swallowing
this here grog. They had reasons o' their own for coming to this
God-forsaken--saving your presence, sirs--this God-forsaken bay, and
they took a short cut to it by arranging to be blown ashore there.
That's my idea o' the matter, though what three Buddhist priests could
find to do in the Bay of Kirkmaiden is clean past my comprehension."

My father raised his eyebrows to indicate the doubt which his
hospitality forbade him from putting into words.

"I think, gentlemen," he said, "that you are both sorely in need of rest
after your perilous adventures. If you will follow me I shall lead you
to your rooms."

He conducted them with old-fashioned ceremony to the laird's best spare
bedroom, and then, returning to me in the parlour, proposed that we
should go down together to the beach and learn whether any