er of the heavens.

Under its lower edge, was a coppery hued, wind streaked border, that
glistened in a dull way.

"The barometer is falling," remarked Rucker as he prepared to go below.
"We're going to have a nasty spell, I guess. You might take a double
reef in that jib if it gets worse. If there's any shortnin' of sail
beyond that, call the captain."

In his walk to and fro the second mate's thoughts reverted to Ralph
occasionally and he took pains later on, to ask Neb if the boy had had
anything to eat.

"Nuttin' but braid an' water, suh. Capn's orders."

"It's a shame," thought Duff. "The lad's sick, so I don't reckon he's
hungry; but he ought to have something more strengthening than that. I
wonder what kind of a hole this sweat box is?"

But as the weather grew worse, Mr. Duff's attention was necessarily
given entirely to the management of the vessel when on watch, and
during his hours off, he usually slept away his fatigue.

The storm that gradually rose lasted, with varying fury, for three
days. The Curlew proved herself a stanch and buoyant craft, easily
controlled and as stiff under sail as a two decker.

It was well for all hands that this was so, for the cyclone was a
dangerous one, being a stray tempest from that center breeding place of
storms, the West Indies. On the second day the two strong men who were
required to steer had to be lashed to the wheel. Great combers
occasionally swept the decks from bow to stern. After one of these the
little schooner would rise, staggering not unlike a drunken man, the
brine pouring in torrents from the scuppers, and the very hull
quivering from the shock of the impact of those tons of water.

The hatches were battened down and after the first day Captain Gary
never left the deck. He had food and drink brought to him, as he swung
to the weather shrouds, where he at times lashed himself, to avoid
being washed overboard.

He was the coolest man on the ship, never losing either presence of
mind or a certain lightness of spirits, totally unlike the apparently
ungovernable fury that possessed him when crossed by any one under his
authority. His slight figure and gloved white hands seemed endowed
with muscles of steel; he was, to all appearance, impervious to fatigue
or fear.

"He's a sailor, right," exclaimed Duff one day to Rucker, after Gary
had brought the schooner unscathed through a mountainous wave that had
threatened to overwhelm everything.