132
XV. THE STROKE 143
XVI. ALONE 146
XVII. FRIENDS IN DESOLATION 153

PART III

XVIII. GOD MADE FRIENDSHIP 159
XIX. THE BIRDS 167
XX. VAE VICTIS 171

PART IV

XXI. TIME PASSES 181
XXII. A NEWCOMER 185
XXIII. RAFT 194
XXIV. A DREAM 203
XXV. STORIES ON THE BEACH 211
XXVI. THE GREAT WIND 225

PART V

XXVII. THE CORRIDOR 233
XXVIII. NIGHT 248
XXIX. THE SUMMIT 253
XXX. THE BAY 259
XXXI. THE SHIP 264
XXXII. THE OPIUM SMOKERS 272
XXXIII. MAINSAIL HAUL 277
XXXIV. THE CARCASSONNE 281

PART VI

XXXV. MARSEILLES 289
XXXVI. THE LEPER 301
XXXVII. A NEW HOME 313

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THE BEACH OF DREAMS

CHAPTER I

THE ALBATROSS

The fo'c'sle, lit by a teapot lamp, shewed the port watch in their
bunks, snoring, all but Harbutt and Raft seated on a chest, Harbutt
patching a pair of trousers, Raft smoking.

Raft was a big red-headed man with eyes that seemed always roving over
great distances as though in search of something. He was thirty-two
years of age and he had used the sea since twelve--twenty years. His
past was a long succession of fo'c'sles, bar-rooms, blazing suns, storms
and sea happenings so run together that all sequence was lost. Beyond
them lay a dismal blotch, his childhood. He had entered the world and
literally and figuratively had been laid at the door of a workhouse; of
his childhood he remembered little, of his parentage he knew nothing. In
drink he was quiet, but most dangerous under certain provocations.

It was as though deep in his being la