sed
before he could get back. Then, too, you are short of food. If you have
to take to the boats, and the weather comes up bad, you may be days in
reaching land. I can bring off two canoe loads of food in the morning.
Dried bananas will be best. As the breeze freshens, you beat up against
it. The nearer you are, the bigger loads I can bring off. Goodby."

He held out his hand. The captain shook it, and was reluctant to let go.
He seemed to cling to it as a drowning sailor clings to a life buoy.

"How do I know you will come back in the morning?" he asked.

"Yes, that's it!" cried the mate. "How do we know but what he's skinning
out to save his own hide?"

McCoy did not speak. He looked at them sweetly and benignantly, and
it seemed to them that they received a message from his tremendous
certitude of soul.

The captain released his hand, and, with a last sweeping glance that
embraced the crew in its benediction, McCoy went over the rail and
descended into his canoe.

The wind freshened, and the Pyrenees, despite the foulness of her
bottom, won half a dozen miles away from the westerly current. At
daylight, with Pitcairn three miles to windward, Captain Davenport made
out two canoes coming off to him. Again McCoy clambered up the side and
dropped over the rail to the hot deck. He was followed by many packages
of dried bananas, each package wrapped in dry leaves.

"Now, Captain," he said, "swing the yards and drive for dear life. You
see, I am no navigator," he explained a few minutes later, as he
stood by the captain aft, the latter with gaze wandering from aloft to
overside as he estimated the Pyrenees' speed. "You must fetch her to
Mangareva. When you have picked up the land, then I will pilot her in.
What do you think she is making?"

"Eleven," Captain Davenport answered, with a final glance at the water
rushing past.

"Eleven. Let me see, if she keeps up that gait, we'll sight Mangareva
between eight and nine o'clock tomorrow morning. I'll have her on the
beach by ten or by eleven at latest. And then your troubles will be all
over."

It almost seemed to the captain that the blissful moment had already
arrived, such was the persuasive convincingness of McCoy.

Captain Davenport had been under the fearful strain of navigating his
burning ship for over two weeks, and he was beginning to feel that he
had had enough.

A heavier flaw of wind struck the back of his neck and whistled by his
ears. He measured