do believe they were for me. I could
have wept myself. Where now was our project of remasting the _Ghost_?
He had done his work well. I sat down on the hatch-combing and rested my
chin on my hands in black despair.

"He deserves to die," I cried out; "and God forgive me, I am not man
enough to be his executioner."

But Maud was by my side, passing her hand soothingly through my hair as
though I were a child, and saying, "There, there; it will all come right.
We are in the right, and it must come right."

I remembered Michelet and leaned my head against her; and truly I became
strong again. The blessed woman was an unfailing fount of power to me.
What did it matter? Only a set-back, a delay. The tide could not have
carried the masts far to seaward, and there had been no wind. It meant
merely more work to find them and tow them back. And besides, it was a
lesson. I knew what to expect. He might have waited and destroyed our
work more effectually when we had more accomplished.

"Here he comes now," she whispered.

I glanced up. He was strolling leisurely along the poop on the port
side.

"Take no notice of him," I whispered. "He's coming to see how we take
it. Don't let him know that we know. We can deny him that satisfaction.
Take off your shoes--that's right--and carry them in your hand."

And then we played hide-and-seek with the blind man. As he came up the
port side we slipped past on the starboard; and from the poop we watched
him turn and start aft on our track.

He must have known, somehow, that we were on board, for he said
"Good-morning" very confidently, and waited, for the greeting to be
returned. Then he strolled aft, and we slipped forward.

"Oh, I know you're aboard," he called out, and I could see him listen
intently after he had spoken.

It reminded me of the great hoot-owl, listening, after its booming cry,
for the stir of its frightened prey. But we did not fir, and we moved
only when he moved. And so we dodged about the deck, hand in hand, like
a couple of children chased by a wicked ogre, till Wolf Larsen, evidently
in disgust, left the deck for the cabin. There was glee in our eyes, and
suppressed titters in our mouths, as we put on our shoes and clambered
over the side into the boat. And as I looked into Maud's clear brown
eyes I forgot the evil he had done, and I knew only that I loved her, and
that because of her the strength was mine to win our way back to the
worl