r the moment, however, his efforts were useless, as he and I both
knew, for the object had been so far to the westward when last seen that
we could not hope to sight her until we were fairly beyond the limits of
the bay; and when this at length happened the upper edge of the sun's
disk was just visible above the western horizon, sinking beneath it at
the precise moment when the catamaran shot through the opening between
two formidable walls of breakers, which were dashing themselves into
spray thirty feet high as they hurled themselves upon the lava reef.

The boat, or whatever it was, ought now to be within the range of our
vision, and Murdock intently scrutinised the darkening sea ahead for
some sign of it, but in vain. Then he turned his glances shoreward and
saw Cunningham standing on the verge of the bluff, vigorously waving us
to keep away.

"Put up your hellum a bit, sir," he admonished me, with his eye still
upon Cunningham; then--"Steady!" as he saw the engineer fling both hands
above his head, and almost at the same instant I caught the faintest
glimpse imaginable of a small dark spot appearing for a moment in
ghostly fashion against the creaming head of a distant breaker, just
clear of the lower end of our lateen yard.

"There she is!" I exclaimed, and as I spoke a star glimmered out of the
deepening blue almost immediately above the spot where the object had
appeared.

"Where away, sir?" demanded the boatswain, again peering ahead under the
sharp of his hand.

"Do you see that star?" I responded, pointing with my disengaged hand.
"Well, she is about half a point to the westward--there she is again,
straight ahead!"

"I see her, sir; I see her," answered Murdock. "Steady as you go, Mr
Temple, and we're bound to pick her up."

I thought so too, although the darkness was falling about us with the
rapidity of a sea fog gathering. Still, the star was a splendid guide,
and steering by it we caught two or three additional glimpses of the
object before the darkness completely enveloped us. Moreover, the
catamaran was slashing along at racing speed, smothering us with spray
every time she hit the crest of a wave; and now my chief fear was that
this same spray might so effectually conceal our surroundings at the
precise moment when we most needed to see, namely, when we were
surmounting a comber, that we might unwittingly overshoot our mark.
Therefore at very brief intervals I admonished Murdock to "keep