sun goes down only
a little way there, and then comes up again in the same place."

"No, I don't," said Poole quietly. "What you see is the glow from the
volcano a few miles back behind the town."

"What!" cried Fitz. "Then we are as close to the port as that?"

"Yes. We are not above a dozen miles away. It's too dark to see now,
or you could make out the mountains that surround the bay."

"Then why couldn't we see them before the sun was set?" cried Fitz
sceptically.

"Because they were all hidden by the clouds and golden haze that gather
round of an evening. Yes, yonder's San Cristobal, and as soon as it is
a little darker if you use the glass you will be able to make out which
are the twinkling electric lights and which are stars."

"Electric lights!" cried Fitz.

"Oh yes, they've got 'em, and tram-cars too. They are pretty wide-awake
in these mushroom Spanish Republic towns."

"Then they will be advanced enough," thought Fitz, "for me to get help
to make my way to rejoin my ship. Sooner or later my chance must come."

Within an hour the soft warm wind had dropped, and the captain gave his
orders, to be followed by the rattling out of the chain-cable through
the hawse-hole. The schooner swung round, and Fitz had to bring the
glass to bear from the other side of the deck to make out the twinkling
lights of the semi-Spanish town.

Everything was wonderfully still, but it was an exciting time for the
lad as he leaned against the bulwarks quite alone, gazing through the
soft mysterious darkness at the distant lights.

There were thoughts in his breast connected with the lowering down of
one of the boats and rowing ashore, but there was the look-out, and the
captain and mate were both on deck, talking together as they walked up
and down, while instead of the men going below and seeming disposed to
sleep, they were lounging about, smoking and chatting together.

And then it was that the middy began to think about one of the four
life-buoys lashed fore and aft, and how it would be if he cut one of
them loose and lowered himself down by a rope, to trust to swimming and
the help of the current to bear him ashore.

His heart throbbed hard at the idea, and then he turned cold, for he was
seaman enough to know the meaning of the tides and currents. Suppose in
his ignorance instead of bearing him ashore they swept him out to sea?
And then he shuddered at his next thought.

There were the sharks, and only