he dozing engineer, now wide awake, came aft at Bones's call, and
accepted the disappearance of the steersman without astonishment.

"We'll have to go back," said Bones, as he swung the wheel round. "I
don't think I'm wrong in sayin' that the east is opposite to the west,
an', if that's true, we ought to be home in time for dinner."

"Sar," said Boosoobi, who, being a coast boy, elected to speak English,
"dem wood she no lib."

"Hey?" gasped Bones, turning pale.

"Dem wood she be done. I look um. I see um. I no find um."

Bones sat down heavily on the rail.

"What does he say?" Pat asked anxiously.

"He says there's no more wood," said Bones. "The horrid old bunkers are
empty, an' we're at the mercy of the tempest."

"Oh, Bones!" she cried, in consternation.

But Bones had recovered.

"What about swimmin' to shore with a line?" he said. "It can't be more
than ten miles!"

It was Ali Abid who prevented the drastic step.

"Sir," he said, "the subject on such occasions should act with
deliberate reserve. Proximity of land presupposes research. The subject
should assist rather than retard research by passivity of action, easy
respiration, and general normality of temperature."

"Which means, dear old Miss Hamilton, that you've got to keep your wool
on," explained Bones.

What might have happened is not to be recorded, for at that precise
moment the s.s. _Paretta_ came barging up over the horizon.

There was still steam in the _Wiggle's_ little boiler, and one log of
wood to keep it at pressure.

Bones was incoherent, but again Ali came to the rescue.

"Sir," he said, "for intimating SOS-ness there is upon steamer or launch
certain scientific apparatus, unadjusted, but susceptible to treatment."

"The wireless!" spluttered Bones. "Good lor', the wireless!"

Twenty minutes later the _Wiggle_ ran alongside the gangway of the s.s.
_Paretta_, anticipating the arrival of the _Zaire_ by half an hour.

The s.s. _Paretta_ was at anchor when Sanders brought the _Zaire_ to the
scene.

He saw the _Wiggle_ riding serenely by the side of the great ship,
looking for all the world like a humming bird under the wings of an
ostrich, and uttered a little prayer of thankfulness.

"They're safe," he said to Hamilton. "O Yoka, take the _Zaire_ to the
other side of the big boat."

"Master, do we go back to-night to seek Ko-boru?" asked Yoka, who was
bearing marks which indicated his strenuous experience, for he had
fo