ess these marvels.

"Why did you make a new path to the well?" she inquired after a rapid
survey.

"A new path!" The pertinent question staggered him.

"Yes, the people who lived here must have had some sort of free
passage."

He lied easily. "I have only cleared away recent growth," he said.

"And why did they dig a cave? It surely would be much more simple to
build a house from all these trees."

"There you puzzle me," he said frankly.

They had entered the cavern but a little way and now came out.

"These empty cartridges are funny. They suggest a fort, a battle."
Woman-like, her words were carelessly chosen, but they were crammed
with inductive force.

Embarked on the toboggan slope of untruth the sailor slid smoothly
downwards.

"Events have colored your imagination, Miss Deane. Even in England men
often preserve such things for future use. They can be reloaded."

"Yes, I have seen keepers do that. This is different. There is an air
of--"

"There is a lot to be done," broke in Jenks emphatically. "We must
climb the hill and get back here in time to light another fire before
the sun goes down. I want to prop a canvas sheet in front of the cave,
and try to devise a lamp."

"Must I sleep inside?" demanded Iris.

"Yes. Where else?"

There was a pause, a mere whiff of awkwardness.

"I will mount guard outside," went on Jenks. He was trying to improve
the edge of the axe by grinding it on a soft stone.

The girl went into the cave again. She was inquisitive, uneasy.

"That arrangement--" she began, but ended in a sharp cry of terror. The
dispossessed birds had returned during the sailor's absence.

"I will kill them," he shouted in anger.

"Please don't. There has been enough of death in this place already."

The words jarred on his ears. Then he felt that she could only allude
to the victims of the wreck.

"I was going to say," she explained, "that we must devise a partition.
There is no help for it until you construct a sort of house. Candidly,
I do not like this hole in the rock. It is a vault, a tomb."

"You told me that I was in command, yet you dispute my orders." He
strove hard to appear brusquely good-humored, indifferent, though for
one of his mould he was absurdly irritable. The cause was over-strain,
but that explanation escaped him.

"Quite true. But if sleeping in the cold, in dew or rain, is bad for
me, it must be equally bad for you. And without you I am helpless, you
know."