a whale-boat's nose thrust skyward on a smoky crest and
disappear naturally, as an actual whale-boat's nose should disappear, as
it slid down the back of the sea. He knew that no whale-boat should be
out there, and he was quite certain no men in the Solomons were mad
enough to be abroad in such a storm.

But the hallucination persisted. A minute later, chancing to open his
eyes, he saw the whale-boat, full length, and saw right into it as it
rose on the face of a wave. He saw six sweeps at work, and in the stern,
clearly outlined against the overhanging wall of white, a man who stood
erect, gigantic, swaying with his weight on the steering-sweep. This he
saw, and an eighth man who crouched in the bow and gazed shoreward. But
what startled Sheldon was the sight of a woman in the stern-sheets,
between the stroke-oar and the steersman. A woman she was, for a braid
of her hair was flying, and she was just in the act of recapturing it and
stowing it away beneath a hat that for all the world was like his own
"Baden-Powell."

The boat disappeared behind the wave, and rose into view on the face of
the following one. Again he looked into it. The men were dark-skinned,
and larger than Solomon Islanders, but the woman, he could plainly see,
was white. Who she was, and what she was doing there, were thoughts that
drifted vaguely through his consciousness. He was too sick to be vitally
interested, and, besides, he had a half feeling that it was all a dream;
but he noted that the men were resting on their sweeps, while the woman
and the steersman were intently watching the run of seas behind them.

"Good boatmen," was Sheldon's verdict, as he saw the boat leap forward on
the face of a huge breaker, the sweeps plying swiftly to keep her on that
front of the moving mountain of water that raced madly for the shore. It
was well done. Part full of water, the boat was flung upon the beach,
the men springing out and dragging its nose to the gate-posts. Sheldon
had called vainly to the house-boys, who, at the moment, were dosing the
remaining patients in the hospital. He knew he was unable to rise up and
go down the path to meet the newcomers, so he lay back in the steamer-
chair, and watched for ages while they cared for the boat. The woman
stood to one side, her hand resting on the gate. Occasionally surges of
sea water washed over her feet, which he could see were encased in rubber
sea-boots. She scrutinized the house sh