orward, falling, across hundred-foot-deep crevices, until his
outstretched hands struck a grip on the opposing wall and his legs could
then be drawn across after. Once, there was a ten-foot leap, above half
a thousand feet of yawning emptiness and down a fathom's length to a
meagre foothold. And he, despite his cool head, lost it another time on
a shelf, a scant twelve inches wide, where all hand-holds seemed to fail
him. And Mauriri, seeing him sway, swung his own body far out and over
the gulf and passed him, at the same time striking him sharply on the
back to brace his reeling brain. Then it was, and forever after, that he
fully knew why Mauriri had been named the Goat Man.

V

The defence of the Big Rock had its good points and its defects.
Impregnable to assault, two men could hold it against ten thousand.
Also, it guarded the passage to open sea. The two schooners, Raoul Van
Asveld, and his cutthroat following were bottled up. Grief, with the ton
of dynamite, which he had removed higher up the rock, was master. This
he demonstrated, one morning, when the schooners attempted to put to
sea. The _Valetta_ led, the whaleboat towing her manned by captured
Fuatino men. Grief and the Goat Man peered straight down from a safe
rock-shelter, three hundred feet above. Their rifles were beside them,
also a glowing fire-stick and a big bundle of dynamite sticks with fuses
and decanators attached. As the whaleboat came beneath, Mauriri shook
his head.

"They are our brothers. We cannot shoot."

For'ard, on the _Valetta_, were several of Grief's own Raiatea sailors.
Aft stood another at the wheel. The pirates were below, or on the other
schooner, with the exception of one who stood, rifle in hand, amidships.
For protection he held Naumoo, the Queen's daughter, close to him.

"That is the chief devil," Mauriri whispered, "and his eyes are blue
like yours. He is a terrible man. See! He holds Naumoo that we may not
shoot him."

A light air and a slight tide were making into the passage, and the
schooner's progress was slow.

"Do you speak English?" Grief called down.

The man startled, half lifted his rifle to the perpendicular, and looked
up. There was something quick and catlike in his movements, and in his
burned blond face a fighting eagerness. It was the face of a killer.

"Yes," he answered. "What do you want?"

"Turn back, or I'll blow your schooner up," Grief warned. He blew on the
fire-stick and whispere