ntents high up on the beach,
where I had set about making a camp. There was driftwood, though not
much, on the beach, and the sight of a coffee tin I had taken from the
_Ghost's_ larder had given me the idea of a fire.

"Blithering idiot!" I was continuing.

But Maud said, "Tut, tut," in gentle reproval, and then asked why I was a
blithering idiot.

"No matches," I groaned. "Not a match did I bring. And now we shall
have no hot coffee, soup, tea, or anything!"

"Wasn't it--er--Crusoe who rubbed sticks together?" she drawled.

"But I have read the personal narratives of a score of shipwrecked men
who tried, and tried in vain," I answered. "I remember Winters, a
newspaper fellow with an Alaskan and Siberian reputation. Met him at the
Bibelot once, and he was telling us how he attempted to make a fire with
a couple of sticks. It was most amusing. He told it inimitably, but it
was the story of a failure. I remember his conclusion, his black eyes
flashing as he said, 'Gentlemen, the South Sea Islander may do it, the
Malay may do it, but take my word it's beyond the white man.'"

"Oh, well, we've managed so far without it," she said cheerfully. "And
there's no reason why we cannot still manage without it."

"But think of the coffee!" I cried. "It's good coffee, too, I know. I
took it from Larsen's private stores. And look at that good wood."

I confess, I wanted the coffee badly; and I learned, not long afterward,
that the berry was likewise a little weakness of Maud's. Besides, we had
been so long on a cold diet that we were numb inside as well as out.
Anything warm would have been most gratifying. But I complained no more
and set about making a tent of the sail for Maud.

I had looked upon it as a simple task, what of the oars, mast, boom, and
sprit, to say nothing of plenty of lines. But as I was without
experience, and as every detail was an experiment and every successful
detail an invention, the day was well gone before her shelter was an
accomplished fact. And then, that night, it rained, and she was flooded
out and driven back into the boat.

The next morning I dug a shallow ditch around the tent, and, an hour
later, a sudden gust of wind, whipping over the rocky wall behind us,
picked up the tent and smashed it down on the sand thirty yards away.

Maud laughed at my crestfallen expression, and I said, "As soon as the
wind abates I intend going in the boat to explore the island. There must