ch energy and deftness to straighten out the
coil, so that it leaped and writhed in his hands like a living thing.

He whistled over the job cheerily and tunelessly, glancing now and again
with a keen, birdlike intelligence towards the motionless figure twenty
yards away that sat with bent head broiling in the sun. His task seemed
a hopeless one, but he tackled it as if he enjoyed it. His brown hands
worked with a will. He was plainly one to make the best of things, and
not to be lightly discouraged--a man of resolution, as the coxswain of
the Spear Point lifeboat needed to be.

After ten minutes of unremitting toil he very suddenly ceased to whistle
and sent a brisk hail across the stretch of sand that intervened between
himself and the solitary fisherman on the edge of the boat.

"Hi--Rufus--Rufus--ahoy!"

The fiery red head turned in his direction without either alacrity or
interest. The fixed eyes came out of their trance-like study and took in
the blue-jerseyed, energetic figure that worked so actively at the
knotted hemp. There was something rather wonderful about those eyes.
They were of the deep, intense blue of a spirit-fed flame--the blue of
the ocean when a storm broods below the horizon.

He made no verbal answer to the hail; only after a moment or two he got
slowly to his feet and began leisurely to cross the sand.

The older man did not watch his progress. His brown, lined face was
bent again over his task.

Rufus the Red drew near and paused. "Want anything?"

He spoke from his chest, in a voice like a deep-toned bell. His arms
hung slack at his sides, but the muscles stood out on them like ropes.

The coxswain of the lifeboat gave his head a brief, upward jerk without
looking at him. "That curly-topped chap staying at The Ship," he said,
"he came messing round after me this morning, wanted to know would I
take him out with the nets one day. I told him maybe you would."

"What did you do that for?" said Rufus.

The coxswain shot him a brief and humorous glance. "I always give you
the plums if I can, my boy," he said. "I said to him, 'Me and my son,
we're partners. Going out with him is just the same as going out with
me, and p'raps a bit better, for he's got the better boat.' So he
sheered off, and said maybe he'd look you up in the evening."

"Maybe I shan't be there," commented Rufus.

The coxswain chuckled, and lashed out an end of rope, narrowly missing
his son's brawny legs. "He's not s