seled him, but
I might as well have argued with a man in a trance.

He leaped over the gunwale and strode up the beach. Again he struck
his priest-like attitude and invoked me to follow.

"The fire upon the altar waits," he repeated, solemnly. Suddenly he
broke into a shrill laugh and ran like a deer in the direction of the
forest that stretched up the slopes of the mountain.

The mate's face, thrust over the rail as I drew alongside the
schooner, plainly bespoke his utter bewilderment. He must have
thought me bereft of my senses to be paddling about at that hour of
the night. The tide had made, and the _Sylph_, righting her listed
masts, was standing clear of the shoal. The deck was astir, and when
the command was given to hoist the sails it was obeyed with an
uneasy alacrity. The men worked frantically in a bright, unnatural
day, for Lakalatcha was now continuously aflame and tossing up
red-hot rocks to the accompaniment of dull sounds of explosion.

My first glance about the deck had been one of relief to note that
Joyce and his wife were not there, although the commotion of getting
under sail must have awakened them. A breeze had sprung up which
would prove a fair wind as soon as the _Sylph_ stood clear of the
point. The mate gave a grunt of satisfaction when at length the
schooner began to dip her bow and lay over to the task. Leaving him
in charge, I started to go below, when suddenly Mrs. Joyce, fully
dressed, confronted me. She seemed to have materialized out of the
air like a ghost. Her hair glowed like burnished copper in the
unnatural illumination which bathed the deck, but her face was ashen,
and the challenge of her eyes made my heart stop short.

"You have been awake long?" I ventured to ask.

"Too long," she answered, significantly, with her face turned away,
looking down into the water. She had taken my arm and drawn me
toward the rail. Now I felt her fingers tighten convulsively. In the
droop of her head and the tense curve of her neck I sensed her mad
impulse which the dark water suggested.

"Mrs. Joyce!" I remonstrated, sharply.

She seemed to go limp all over at the words. I drew her along the
deck for a faltering step or two, while her eyes continued to brood
upon the water rushing past. Suddenly she spoke:

"What other way out is there?"

"Never that," I said, shortly. I urged her forward again. "Is your
husband asleep?"

"Thank God, yes!"

"Then you have been awake--"

"For over