"I accept your offer gladly," she said softly. "You are very, very kind,
Mr. Verslun. It may be, as you say, the jumping off place of the world
down here at the very outposts of civilization, but the power that
protects one in the crowded cities is surely here as well. Good-night,
friend."

It was an hour after the time when Miss Herndon went below that I asked
the captain's permission to go along with the expedition. He plucked his
scrawny beard with a nervous hand as he stood staring at me.

"What the devil do you want to go for?" he asked.

"For the fun of the thing."

"I don't know," he muttered. "I'll see Leith."

He turned away and I walked for'ard. The beauty of the night was
extraordinary. The yacht seemed to be veneered with a soft luminous
paint that gave us the appearance of a ghostly ship skimming over a
ghostly ocean.

At the top of the fo'c'stle ladder I found a native stretched full
length and sobbing mightily. He walloped his head against the planks
when I endeavoured to get him upon his feet, and the sobs shook his
frame.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"Toni! Toni! Toni!" he wailed. "Toni he gone. Toni, my brother, all same
come from Suva, now him dead."