ome one in dredging for the
invaluable pearl-oysters. They were afraid their errand would be
suspected, or they would be attacked after they should secure their
prize.

One day, under the pretense of wanting medicine, Hyde Brazzier
suddenly appeared at the cabin door. The mate and captain were, as
usual, studying the chart, and while the mate was ransacking the
medicine chest for the drug, that single eye of the sailor secured
five minutes' sharp scrutiny of the all-important map.

Redvignez and Brazzier were not much together, as a matter of course,
for one was in the captain's watch and the other in the mate's, but
during the long, pleasant days and nights when they were voyaging
toward the South Seas, they obtained many opportunities for
confidential talks. All this might have been in the natural order of
things on board the schooner, where the discipline was not strict, but
Abe Storms had become pretty well satisfied that harm was meant, and
mischief was brewing. He saw it in the looks and manner of these two
men, who, while they were watching others, did not suspect they were
watched in turn.

About Pomp he was not so certain. The steward and cook seemed to be on
good terms with the two sailors, and he frequently sat with them as
they formed a little group forward, on the bright moonlight nights,
when they preferred to sit thus and smoke and spin yarns to going
below and catching slumber, when it was their privilege to do so.

"I believe he is in with them," was the conclusion which Storms, the
mate, finally reached, after watching and listening as best he could
for several days. "They're hatching some conspiracy--most likely a
mutiny to take possession of the ship. Captain Bergen doesn't suspect
it--he is so absorbed in the pearl business; and I'll let him alone
for the present, though it may be best to give him a hint or two to
keep him on his guard."

It never can be known what the restraining power of little Inez
Hawthorne was on board that vessel on her extraordinary voyage to the
Paumotu Islands, in the South Seas. She lived over again the same life
that was hers during the few days spent on the _Polynesia_. She ran
hither and thither, climbing into dangerous places at times, but with
such grace and command of her limbs that she never once fell or even
lost her balance. She chatted and laughed with Brazzier and Redvig,
but she preferred the others, and showed it so plainly in her manner,
that, unfortun