was only one fresh case, while half a dozen boys crawled
weakly away to the barracks. He wondered if it was the wind that was
blowing the disease away and cleansing the pestilential land.

By eleven a messenger arrived from Balesuna village, dispatched by
Seelee. The _Jessie_ had gone ashore half-way between the village and
Neal Island. It was not till nightfall that two of the crew arrived,
reporting the drowning of Captain Oleson and of the one remaining boy. As
for the _Jessie_, from what they told him Sheldon could not but conclude
that she was a total loss. Further to hearten him, he was taken by a
shivering fit. In half an hour he was burning up. And he knew that at
least another day must pass before he could undertake even the smallest
dose of quinine. He crawled under a heap of blankets, and a little later
found himself laughing aloud. He had surely reached the limit of
disaster. Barring earthquake or tidal-wave, the worst had already
befallen him. The _Flibberty-Gibbet_ was certainly safe in Mboli Pass.
Since nothing worse could happen, things simply had to mend. So it was,
shivering under his blankets, that he laughed, until the house-boys, with
heads together, marvelled at the devils that were in him.

CHAPTER IV--JOAN LACKLAND

By the second day of the northwester, Sheldon was in collapse from his
fever. It had taken an unfair advantage of his weak state, and though it
was only ordinary malarial fever, in forty-eight hours it had run him as
low as ten days of fever would have done when he was in condition. But
the dysentery had been swept away from Berande. A score of convalescents
lingered in the hospital, but they were improving hourly. There had been
but one more death--that of the man whose brother had wailed over him
instead of brushing the flies away.

On the morning of the fourth day of his fever, Sheldon lay on the
veranda, gazing dimly out over the raging ocean. The wind was falling,
but a mighty sea was still thundering in on Berande beach, the flying
spray reaching in as far as the flagstaff mounds, the foaming wash
creaming against the gate-posts. He had taken thirty grains of quinine,
and the drug was buzzing in his ears like a nest of hornets, making his
hands and knees tremble, and causing a sickening palpitation of the
stomach. Once, opening his eyes, he saw what he took to be an
hallucination. Not far out, and coming in across the _Jessie's_
anchorage, he saw