l and McCoy," said Adams; "I know the sound o' their
ill-natured voices."

Presently the two men could be seen through the trees. Quintal was
sitting on a felled tree, looking fiercely at McCoy, who stood beside
him.

"I tell you the baccy is mine," said Quintal.

"It's nothin' o' the sort, it's mine," answered McCoy, snatching the
coveted weed out of the other's hand.

Quintal jumped up, hit McCoy on the forehead, and knocked him down.

McCoy instantly rose, hit Quintal on the nose, and tumbled him over the
log on which he had been sitting.

Not much the worse, Quintal sprang to his feet, and a furious set-to
would have immediately followed if the arrival of Christian and his
party had not prevented it. It was no easy matter to calm the ruffled
spirits of the men who had treated each other so unceremoniously, and
there is no doubt the bad feeling would have been kept up about the
tobacco in dispute if Christian had not intervened. McCoy reiterated
stoutly that the tobacco was his.

"You are wrong," said Christian, quietly; "it belongs to Quintal. I
gave it to him this morning."

As there was no getting over this, McCoy returned the tobacco with a bad
grace, and Christian was about to give the assembled party some good
advice about not quarrelling, when the mother of little Sally appeared
suddenly, wringing her hands, and exclaiming in her native tongue, "My
child is lost! my child is lost!"

As every one of the party, even the roughest, was fond of Sally, there
was an eager and anxious chorus of questioning.

"Where away did 'ee lose her?" asked McCoy; but the poor mother could
only wring her hands and cry, "Lost! lost!"

"Has she gone over the cliffs?" asked Edward Young, who came up at the
moment; but the woman would say nothing but "Lost! lost!" amid floods of
tears.

Fortunately some of the other women, who had been away collecting
cocoa-nuts, arrived just then, and somewhat relieved the men by
prevailing on the mother to explain that, although she could not say
positively her child had fallen over the cliffs, or come by any other
mishap, Sally had nevertheless disappeared early in the forenoon, and
that she had been searching for her ever since without success.

The process of interrogation was conducted chiefly by Isabella, _alias_
Mainmast, the wife of Fletcher Christian, and Susannah, the wife of
Edward Young; and it was interesting to note how anxious were the native
men, Talaloo, Timoa, O