ing in the stern in his brave blue coat, and at the sight of him my
heart gave a great leap for joy. We opened our seaward gate at once, and
in a moment Marjorie and Lancelot and I were racing to the strand,
followed by half a dozen others, leaving the stockade well guarded, and
orders to shoot Jensen on the first sign of any return of the pirates
from the woods. Though, indeed, we felt pretty sure that they would
make no further attempt against us, having lost their leader, and being
now menaced by this new and unexpected peril.

As the boat drew nearer shore Lancelot tied a handkerchief to the point
of his cutlass and waved it in the air, and at sight of it the figure in
blue in the stern raised his hat, and the men rowing, seeing him do
this, raised a lusty cheer, and pulled with a warmer will than ever, so
that in a few more minutes their keel grated on the sand.

Captain Amber leaped out of the boat like a boy, splashing through the
water to join us, while the Dutch seamen hauled the boat up and stared
at us stolidly. Captain Amber clasped Marjorie's hand and murmured to
himself 'Thank God!' while tears stood in his china-blue eyes, and were
answered, for the first time that I ever saw them there, by tears in
Marjorie's. Next he embraced Lancelot, and then he turned to me and
wrung my hand with the same heartiness as on that first day in
Sendennis, and it seemed to me for the moment as if that strand and
island and all those leagues of land and water had ceased to be, and I
were back again in the windy High Street, with my mother's shop-bell
tinkling.

Only for a moment, however. There was no time for day-dreams. Hurriedly
we told Captain Amber all that we had to tell. Much of the ugly story we
found that he knew, and how he knew you shall learn later. Our immediate
duty was to secure the pirates who were still at large on the island,
and this proved an easy business. For the Dutch commander, who claimed
the authority of his nation for all that region, sent one of his men
with a flag of truce, accompanied by one of us for interpreter, to let
them know that if they did not surrender unconditionally he would first
bombard the wood in which they sheltered, and then land a party of men,
who would cut down any survivors without mercy. As there was no help for
it, the pirates did surrender. They came out of the woods, a sorry gang,
and laid down their arms, and with the help of the Dutchmen, who lent us
irons, we soon