of the wind aloft.

He looked with fresh eyes upon his companions. They too were actors in
the play--the forceful blind man, the lovable cripple, and this
blooming, merry-eyed girl whose every glance sent a strange thrill
through his being. They were his partners, his shipmates! He was
committed with them to this adventure, and he was glad. They, too,
seemed glad, for they were smiling a welcome.

"Of course, Martin, we feel rather diffident before you," spoke up
Little Billy. "We know it is an outrage, this causing you to lose your
comfortable berth ashore, and----"

"Say no more about it," interrupted Martin. "You had sufficient
provocation for all your actions. And really, believe me, I am very
glad I fell in with you. I am glad to be here. I have wanted to go to
sea all my life. We are going to Fire Mountain now, aren't we?"

"That's the spirit!" cried the captain heartily. "And you will not
lose by your joining us, lad. Even if this venture prove a failure,
there is still a mighty good living to be picked up on the Pacific."

"We are a sort of cooperative association," explained Ruth. "We work
on shares; something like the whaleman's lay, though more generous. Of
course, we pay straight wages to the hands forward. But we of the
afterguard work this way: After all expenses of a voyage have been
paid, the captain as master and owner takes fifty per cent. of the net
profits. The remaining fifty per cent. is divided among the rest of
us, not according to rank but pro rata. We want you to join the
partnership. You are to share equally with Billy, the bosun, and
myself. And if we really find this stuff on Fire Mountain, your share
will come to a neat fortune. No, don't start protesting--of course you
are entitled to it."

"And don't commence counting your chickens before they are hatched,"
admonished Little Billy. "It is quite on the cards that we will reach
Fire Mountain to discover Carew ahead of us. Or somebody else may have
happened upon the stuff during the twenty-five years since Winters
died. The last is not probable, but the first is, at least, possible.
It will not do for us to rest in false security. Carew and his backers
are sure to have a try for that million on Fire Mountain."

"But he does not know the island's position. I am sure of that!"
objected Ruth.

"But he does know Bering Sea, almost as well as I," spoke up Captain
Dabney. "And he knows the particular corner of B