fs of the huskie, and
outside the tent Ellen's voice fraught with fear and anxiety, was
calling:

"Shane! O, Shane! Wake up! Quick!"

There was a stealthy sound as of lapping water close at hand; then
Boreland's shout:

"For God's sake, Kayak, get up!"

Jean, now fully awake, ran out into the grey that precedes the dawn.
There was not a breath of wind, and the sea, glassy and as grey as the
sky above, was smoother than she ever saw it afterward on Kon Klayu.
There was something sinister in the gently heaving stillness of the
vast body of water, for not ten feet from the flap of the tent tiny
ripples of the incoming tide were swallowing at the dry sand with
sibilant softness. One end of the pile of provisions just below the
tent was already a foot deep in the advancing flood.

There was no thought of dressing. The race with the sea began at once.
No one knew when the tide would be full, but each realized that should
the provisions be ruined or swept away by the water, slow starvation
would terminate the quest for the gold of Kon Klayu. Every moment
counted. Every hand must help.

Grim-faced and silent, Boreland and Kayak Bill drew on their tremendous
reserve power, and during the next few hours performed almost
super-human feats of strength and endurance in transferring the
provisions to safety. Ellen and Jean, regardless of unbound hair and
thin night-robes, dashed out time after time into the ever rising tide
to snatch up sacks of flour or boxes of canned goods, running with them
far above the beachline. In the face of the threatened catastrophe
they were hardly aware of wet or cold or the weight of objects. They
were small women, but in the peril of the moment they carried
back-breaking loads that would ordinarily have taxed the muscles of a
strong man. Even Lollie, after the first look of sleepy wonder, became
alive to the situation when he saw his new pet, the pigeon, clutching
the top of its cage above six inches of water. He rescued the bird and
while the others were busy with the outfit, rolled up the blankets one
by one, and carried them beyond danger. Before he had finished, the
relentless tide had crept up about the stove, the box where all the
cooking utensils had been placed, and the four rubber boots drying on
their stakes. The little fellow, looking absurdly babylike in his
nightgown, for all his eight years, splashed out to rescue the
threatened articles. Later, at a word from his f