yed the part to the best of my
ability, and with such success that I brought the laughter back into her
dear eyes and song on her lips; for she sang to me before she went to an
early bed. It was the first time I had heard her sing, and I lay by the
fire, listening and transported, for she was nothing if not an artist in
everything she did, and her voice, though not strong, was wonderfully
sweet and expressive.

I still slept in the boat, and I lay awake long that night, gazing up at
the first stars I had seen in many nights and pondering the situation.
Responsibility of this sort was a new thing to me. Wolf Larsen had been
quite right. I had stood on my father's legs. My lawyers and agents had
taken care of my money for me. I had had no responsibilities at all.
Then, on the _Ghost_ I had learned to be responsible for myself. And
now, for the first time in my life, I found myself responsible for some
one else. And it was required of me that this should be the gravest of
responsibilities, for she was the one woman in the world--the one small
woman, as I loved to think of her.

CHAPTER XXX

No wonder we called it Endeavour Island. For two weeks we toiled at
building a hut. Maud insisted on helping, and I could have wept over her
bruised and bleeding hands. And still, I was proud of her because of it.
There was something heroic about this gently-bred woman enduring our
terrible hardship and with her pittance of strength bending to the tasks
of a peasant woman. She gathered many of the stones which I built into
the walls of the hut; also, she turned a deaf ear to my entreaties when I
begged her to desist. She compromised, however, by taking upon herself
the lighter labours of cooking and gathering driftwood and moss for our
winter's supply.

The hut's walls rose without difficulty, and everything went smoothly
until the problem of the roof confronted me. Of what use the four walls
without a roof? And of what could a roof be made? There were the spare
oars, very true. They would serve as roof-beams; but with what was I to
cover them? Moss would never do. Tundra grass was impracticable. We
needed the sail for the boat, and the tarpaulin had begun to leak.

"Winters used walrus skins on his hut," I said.

"There are the seals," she suggested.

So next day the hunting began. I did not know how to shoot, but I
proceeded to learn. And when I had expended some thirty shells for three
seals, I de