he girl still clinging to my sleeve, as though fearful of
being left alone. The man was a repulsive brute, his face stained with
blood, dripping from a cut across his low forehead. He looked up
sullenly at our approach, but made no effort to rise.

"What's your name, my man?" I asked in Spanish.

"Jose Mendez, Senor." "You were aboard the _Namur_?"

He growled out an answer which I interpreted to signify assent, but
Watkins lost his temper.

"Look yere, you black villain," he roared, driving the lesson home
with his boot "don't be a playin' possum yer. Stand up an' answer
Mister Carlyle, or yer'll git a worse clip than I give yer afore. Whar
is the bloody bark?"

"Pounding her heart out on the rocks yonder," he said more civilly,
"unless she's slid off, an' gone down."

"Wrecked? Where?"

"Hell, I ain't sure--what's west frum here?"

"Off our port quarter."

"Then that's 'bout where she is--maybe a mile, er so."

"What about the crew?"

"They got away in the boats, an' likely mostly are ashore. We were in
the last boat launched, an' headed out so far ter get 'round a ledge
o' rocks, we got lost in the fog. Then the mist sorter opened, an'
give us a glimpse o' yer topsails. Manuel was for boarding you right
away, and the rest of us talked it over, and thought it would be all
right. We didn't expect no fight, once we got aboard."

"Expected to find something easy, of course? Perhaps it would have
been if you fellows in the boat had held your tongues. By any chance,
do you know now who we are?"

He rolled his eyes toward Watkins, and then at Schmitt engaged in some
job across the deck.

"Those two used to be on the _Namur_," he said, his tone again
sullen. "Are you the fellers who locked us in between decks?"

"We are the ones, Jose. You were up against fighting men when you came
in over our rail. What is it you see out there, Harwood?"

The seaman, who was standing with hollowed hands shading his eyes,
staring forth into the swirling drapery of fog, turned at my call, and
pointed excitedly.

"There's a bark aground yonder, sir; and by God, it looks like the
_Namur_!"

Even as I crossed the deck to his side, eagerly searching the
direction indicated, the wreaths of obscuring mist seemed to divide,
as though swept apart by some mighty hand, and there in the full glow
of the sun, a picture in a frame, lay the wrecked vessel. Others saw
it as I did, and a chorus of voices gave vent to recognition.