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describing him luridly as such that by the simplest laws of nature he could not

possibly be; but this girl had spoken coolly, and her descriptions had been

explicit--backed by illustrations. She had given real reasons for her contempt,

and somehow it had made that contempt seem very tangible.

One who had known Billy would have expected him to fly into a rage and attack

the girl brutally after her scathing diatribe. Billy did nothing of the sort. Barbara

Harding's words seemed to have taken all the fight out of him. He stood looking at

her for a moment--it was one of the strange contradictions of Billy Byrne's

personality that he could hold his eyes quite steady and level, meeting the gaze of

another unwaveringly--and in that moment something happened to Billy Byrne's

perceptive faculties. It was as though scales which had dimmed his mental vision

had partially dropped away, for suddenly he saw what he had not before seen--a

very beautiful girl, brave and unflinching before the brutal menace of his attitude,

and though the mucker thought that he still hated her, the realization came to

him that he must not raise a hand against her--that for the life of him he could

not, nor ever again against any other woman. Why this change, Billy did not

know, he simply knew that it was so, and with an ugly grunt he turned his back

upon her and walked away.

A slight breeze had risen from the southwest since Theriere had left Barbara

Harding and now all hands were busily engaged in completing the jury rigging

that the Halfmoon might take advantage of the wind and make the shore that

rose abruptly from the bosom of the ocean but a league away.

Before the work was completed the wind increased rapidly, so that when the tiny

bit of canvas was hoisted into position it bellied bravely, and the Halfmoon moved

heavily forward toward the land.

"We gotta make a mighty quick run of it," said Skipper Simms to Ward, "or we'll

go to pieces on them rocks afore ever we find a landing."

"That we will if this wind rises much more," replied Ward; "and's far as I can see

there ain't no more chance to make a landing there than there would be on the

side of a house."

And indeed as the Halfmoon neared the towering cliffs it seemed utterly hopeless

that aught else than a fly could find a foothold upon that sheer and rocky face

that rose abruptly from the ocean's surface.

Some two hundred yards from the shore it became evident that there was no

landing to be made directly before them, and so the course of the ship was altered

to carry them along parallel to the shore in an effort to locate a cove, or beach

where a landing might safely be effected.

The Mucker