"Longer'n that, Trot," said Cap'n Bill, but his voice
was a little troubled and unsteady.

"But if we stay here we're bound to starve in time,"
continued the girl, "while if we go into the dark hole
--"

"Some things are more hard to face than starvation,"
said the sailor-man, gravely. "We don't know what's
inside that dark hole: Trot, nor where it might lead us
to."

"There's a way to find that out," she persisted.

Instead of replying, Cap'n Bill began searching in
his pockets. He soon drew out a little package of fish-
hooks and a long line. Trot watched him join them
together. Then he crept a little way up the slope and
turned over a big rock. Two or three small crabs began
scurrying away over the sands and the old sailor caught
them and put one on his hook and the others in his
pocket. Coming back to the pool he swung the hook over
his shoulder and circled it around his head and cast it
nearly into the center of the water, where he allowed
it to sink gradually, paying out the line as far as it
would go. When the end was reached, he began drawing it
in again, until the crab bait was floating on the
surface.

Trot watched him cast the line a second time, and a