a some five hundred miles south of the
Carolines. The wind had fallen soon after Papua had dropped astern.
The Suwarna's ability to make her twelve knots an hour without it had
made me very fully forgive her for not being as fragrant as the Javan
flower for which she was named. Da Costa, her captain, was a
garrulous Portuguese; his mate was a Canton man with all the marks of
long and able service on some pirate junk; his engineer was a
half-breed China-Malay who had picked up his knowledge of power
plants, Heaven alone knew where, and, I had reason to believe, had
transferred all his religious impulses to the American built deity of
mechanism he so faithfully served. The crew was made up of six huge,
chattering Tonga boys.

The Suwarna had cut through Finschafen Huon Gulf to the protection of
the Bismarcks. She had threaded the maze of the archipelago
tranquilly, and we were then rolling over the thousand-mile stretch of
open ocean with New Hanover far behind us and our boat's bow pointed
straight toward Nukuor of the Monte Verdes. After we had rounded
Nukuor we should, barring accident, reach Ponape in not more than
sixty hours.

It was late afternoon, and on the demure little breeze that marched
behind us came far-flung sighs of spice-trees and nutmeg flowers. The
slow prodigious swells of the Pacific lifted us in gentle, giant hands
and sent us as gently down the long, blue wave slopes to the next
broad, upward slope. There was a spell of peace over the ocean,
stilling even the Portuguese captain who stood dreamily at the wheel,
slowly swaying to the rhythmic lift and fall of the sloop.

There came a whining hail from the Tonga boy lookout draped lazily
over the bow.

"Sail he b'long port side!"

Da Costa straightened and gazed while I raised my glass. The vessel
was a scant mile away, and must have been visible long before the
sleepy watcher had seen her. She was a sloop about the size of the
Suwarna, without power. All sails set, even to a spinnaker she
carried, she was making the best of the little breeze. I tried to read
her name, but the vessel jibed sharply as though the hands of the man
at the wheel had suddenly dropped the helm--and then with equal
abruptness swung back to her course. The stern came in sight, and on
it I read Brunhilda.

I shifted my glasses to the man at wheel. He was crouching down over
the spokes in a helpless, huddled sort of way, and even as I looked
the vessel veered again, ab