, and a tool-box, and a telescope,
and a pair of home-made socks for grandfather. We were fain to take
possession of our treasures at once, but the old gentleman forbade it,
and made us put them all back in the hamper and wait till the morning.

So we went to bed early, hoping thereby, I suppose, to hasten the
morning. But instead of that, the hours dragged past as though the
night would never go. We heard nine o'clock strike, and ten, and
eleven. We weren't in the humour for sleeping, and told one another all
the stories we knew--finishing up, of course, with the wreck of the
"Wolf King." Then we lay for a long time listening to the storm
outside, which seemed to get wilder and wilder as the night dragged on.
The tide, which had been only just turned when we went to bed, sounded
now close under the house, and the thunder of the great waves as they
broke on the sand seemed to make the very earth vibrate.

Surely it must have been a night like this when the "Wolf King"--

"Tom!"

"What?"

"Are you awake?"

"Yes."

"It's a storm, isn't it?"

There was a silence for some time, and I supposed Jack had dozed off,
but he began again presently. "Tom!"

"What?"

"Hadn't we better go on the jetty?"

"Why?"

"There might be a wreck, you know."

"So there might."

Next moment we were out of bed and dressing quietly.

We need not have minded about the noise, for the roar of the storm
outside would have prevented any one from hearing sounds twenty times
louder than those we made, as we crept into our clothes and pulled on
our boots.

"All ready, Jack?"

"Yes; mind how you go down."

We crept downstairs, past grandfather's room, where a light was burning,
down into the hall, and through the passage to the back door. We pulled
the bolts and opened it carefully. Fortunately, it was on the sheltered
side of the house. Had it been the front, the blast that would have
rushed in would certainly have discovered our retreat.

We stepped cautiously out and closed the door behind us. We were
surprised to find how still it seemed at first, compared with what we
had imagined. But next moment, as we got past the back of the house and
came suddenly into the full force of the wind, we knew that the storm
was even fiercer than we supposed. At first we could barely stand, as
with heads down and knees bent we struggled forward. But we got more
used to it in a little while, and once in Harbour Street we were agai