ime to time, as he consulted it,
of the lay of their course. They were just then ploughing almost due
northeast over a broad expanse, beckoned on by the distant flicker of a
gas-buoy. But the information was less than worthless, and every
reasonable guess he might have made as to their next move would have
proved even more futile than merely idle; for when they had rounded the
buoy, instead of standing, as any reasonable beings might have been
expected to, on to Fisher's Island or at a tangent north toward the
Connecticut littoral, they swung off something south of east--a course
that could lead them nowhere but to the immensities of the sea itself.

Whitaker's breath caught in his throat as he examined this startling
prospect. The Atlantic was something a trifle bigger than he had
bargained for. To dare its temper, with a southwester brewing (by every
weather sign he knew) in what was to all intents an open boat, since he
would never be able to leave the cockpit for an instant's shelter in the
cabin in any sort of a seaway--!

He shook a dubious, vastly troubled head. But he held on grimly in the
face of dire forebodings.

Once out from under the lee of Gardiner's Island, a heavier run of waves
beset them, catching the boats almost squarely on the beam: fortunately
a sea of long, smooth, slow shouldering rollers, as yet not angry. Now
and again, for all that, one would favour the _Trouble_ with a
quartering slap that sent a shower of spray aboard her to drench
Whitaker and swash noisily round the cockpit ere the self-bailing
channels could carry it off. He was quickly wet to the skin and
shivering. The hour was past midnight, and the strong air whipping in
from the open sea had a bitter edge. His only consolation inhered in the
reflection that he had companions in his misery: those who drove the
leading boat could hardly escape what he must suffer; though he hoped
and believed that the woman was shut below, warm and dry in the cabin.

Out over the dark waste to starboard a white light lifted, flashing. For
a while a red eye showed beneath it, staring unwinkingly with a
steadfast and sardonic glare, then disappeared completely, leaving only
the blinking white. Far ahead another light, fixed white, hung steadily
over the port counter, and so remained for over an hour.

Then most gradually the latter wore round upon the beam and dropped
astern. Whitaker guessed at random, but none the less rightly, that they
were wea