e that surprised himself. It was as
though he had been accustomed to such incidents all his life. When one
of the bullies swaggered down and said with an oath that he'd be
damned if he'd have any more of it and lifted one foot into a boat,
Wilson touched him lightly upon the shoulder and ordered him back.

The man turned and squared his shoulders for a blow. But the hand
upon his shoulder remained, and even in the dusk he saw that the eyes
continued unflinchingly upon him.

"Get back," said Wilson, quietly.

The man turned, and without a word slunk to his place among his
fellows. Wilson watched him as curiously as though he had been merely
a bystander. And yet when he realized that the man had done his
bidding, had done it because he feared to do otherwise, he felt a
tingling sense of some new power. It was a feeling of physical
individuality--a consciousness of manhood in the arms and legs and
back. To him man had until now been purely a creature of the intellect
gauged by his brain capacity. Here where the arm counted he found
himself taking possession of some fresh nature within him.

"Take the lantern," shouted Stubbs; "go to where we sat and wave it
three times, slow like, back and forth."

Wilson obeyed. Almost instantly he saw a launch steal from the ship's
side and make directly for the island.

"Now, men," commanded Stubbs, "take your kits, get into fours and
march to the left."

With a shove here, a warning there, he moulded the scattered groups
into a fairly orderly line. Then he directed them by twos into the
small boat from the launch, which had come as far inshore as possible.
Wilson stood opposite and kept the line intact. There was no trouble.
The launch made two trips, and on the last Stubbs and Wilson
clambered in, leaving the island as deserted as the ocean in their
wake. Stubbs wiped his forehead with a red bandanna handkerchief and
lighted up his short clay pipe with a sigh of relief.

"So far, so good," he said. "The only thing you can bank on is what's
over with. There's several of them gents I should hate to meet on a
dark night, an' the same will bear steady watchin' on this trip."

He squatted in the stern, calmly facing the clouded faces with the air
of a laborer who has completed a good day's work. As they came
alongside the ship he instructed each man how to mount the swaying
rope ladder and watched them solicitously until they clambered over
the side.

Most of them took this as