w, after the Tongan had gone back to his
bunk. "I smell something more than shell. Those three men are standing
watches over their Kanakas. That man's no more Swithin Hall than I am."

Snow whistled from the impact of a new idea.

"I've got it!" he cried.

"And I'll name it," Grief retorted, "It's in your mind that the _Emily
L._ was their schooner?"

"Just that. They're raising and rotting the shell, while she's gone for
more divers, or provisions, or both."

"And I agree with you." Grief glanced at the cabin clock and evinced
signs of bed-going. "He's a sailor. The three of them are. But they're
not island men. They're new in these waters."

Again Snow whistled.

"And the _Emily L._ is lost with all hands," he said. "We know that.
They're marooned here till Swithin Hall comes. Then he'll catch them
with all the shell."

"Or they'll take possession of his schooner."

"Hope they do!" Snow muttered vindictively. "Somebody ought to rob him.
Wish I was in their boots. I'd balance off that sixty thousand."

VII

A week passed, during which time the _Uncle Toby_ was ready for sea,
while Grief managed to allay any suspicion of him by the shore crowd.

Even Gorman and Watson accepted him at his self-description. Throughout
the week Grief begged and badgered them for the longitude of the island.

"You wouldn't have me leave here lost," he finally urged. "I can't get a
line on my chronometer without your longitude."

Hall laughingly refused.

"You're too good a navigator, Mr. Anstey, not to fetch New Guinea or
some other high land."

"And you're too good a navigator, Mr. Hall," Grief replied, "not to know
that I can fetch your island any time by running down its latitude."

On the last evening, ashore, as usual, to dinner, Grief got his first
view of the pearls they had collected. Mrs. Hall, waxing enthusiastic,
had asked her husband to bring forth the "pretties," and had spent half
an hour showing them to Grief. His delight in them was genuine, as well
as was his surprise that they had made so rich a haul.

"The lagoon is virgin," Hall explained. "You saw yourself that most
of the shell is large and old. But it's funny that we got most of the
valuable pearls in one small patch in the course of a week. It was a
little treasure house. Every oyster seemed filled--seed pearls by the
quart, of course, but the perfect ones, most of that bunch there, came
out of the small patch."

Grief ran his eye over t