e road he had just traversed, came
a howl, long-drawn and terrifyingly familiar. Joshua heard it, jumped
sidewise, jerked at the halter and, as if playing "snap the whip,"
sent his would-be captor heels over head over the edge of the bank and
rolling down the sandy slope. The halter flew from Brown's hands, he
rolled and bumped and clutched at clumps of grass and bushes. Then he
struck the beach and stopped, spread-eagled on the wet sand.

A voice said: "Well--by--TIME!"

Brown looked up. Seth Atkins, a paint pail in one hand and a dripping
brush in the other, was standing beside him, blank astonishment written
on his features.

"Well--by time!" said Seth again, and with even stronger emphasis.

The substitute assistant raised himself to his knees, rubbed his back
with one hand, and then, turning, sat in the sand and returned his
superior's astonished gaze with one of equal bewilderment.

"Hello!" he gasped. "Well, by George! it's you, isn't it! What are you
doing here?"

The lightkeeper put down the pail of paint.

"What am I doin'?" he repeated. "What am I doin'--? Say!" His
astonishment changed to suspicion and wrath. "Never you mind what I'm
doin'," he went on. "That's my affairs. What are YOU doin' here? That's
what I want to know."

Brown rubbed the sand out of his hair.

"I don't know exactly what I am doing--yet," he panted.

"You don't, hey? Well, you'd better find out. Maybe I can help you to
remember. Sneakin' after me, wa'n't you? Spyin', to find out what I was
up to, hey?"

He shook the wet paint brush angrily at his helper. Brown looked at him
for an instant; then he rose to his feet.

"Spyin' on me, was you?" repeated Seth.

"Didn't I tell you that mindin' your own business was part of our dicker
if you was goin' to stay at Eastboro lighthouse? Didn't I tell you
that?"

The young man answered with a contemptuous shrug. Turning on his heel,
he started to walk away. Atkins sprang after him.

"Answer me," he ordered. "Didn't I say you'd got to mind your own
business?"

"You did," coldly.

"You bet I did! And was you mindin' it?"

"No. I was minding yours--like a fool. Now you may mind it yourself."

"Hold on there! Where you goin'?"

"Back to the lights. And you may go to the devil, or anywhere else that
suits your convenience, and take your confounded menagerie with you."

"My menag--What on earth? Say, hold on! Mercy on us, what's that?"

From the top of the bluff came a crashi