looked about for me. It was the merest film, the faintest streak, dim as a filament of spider's web; but it was directly ahead, and it was easy to guess that unless the steamer was heading east or west she must be coming our way, for assuredly, though the Light of the World was sweeping through it at some six or seven knots, we were not going to overhaul a steamer at that pace.

A telescope lay in brackets inside the companionway; I fetched and levelled it, but there was nothing more to be seen than the soaring of the thin blue vein of smoke from behind the edge of the sea, where the dark, rich central blue of it went lightening out into a tint of opal. It did not take long, however, to discover, by the hanging of the smoke in the same place, that the steamer was heading directly for us. I put down the glass, and said to Mr. Jones:

'Will you be so good as to call the Captain and tell him that there is a steamer in sight, coming this way?'

'I have no orders to call the Captain merely to report a ship in sight, sir,' he answered.

'That may be,' said I; 'but here is a chance for us to leave this vessel, and the Captain might not thank you to keep him ignorant of the opportunity.'

'I can't help it, sir. My duty here is to obey orders and to do what's expected of me, and no more;' and so saying, he marched shambling aft; yet I will not say that his manner of leaving me was abrupt or offensive.

'There is no time to be lost, Helga,' said I. 'If that steamer is doing ten and we are doing six the joint speed is sixteen knots, and she will be abreast of us and away again quickly. I will report to the Captain myself,' with which I went on to the quarter-deck and passed into the cabin and knocked on the door of Captain Bunting's berth.

He immediately cried:

'Who's there?'

'Mr. Tregarthen,' I answered.

'Are you alone?' he called.

I told him I was.

'Then pray walk in,' said he.

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