Trask was more worried than he liked to admit, even to himself. While he had nothing tangible in the way of suspicion, he disliked the manner in which events had shaped themselves, or had been shaped by Jarrow.

From the time they had raised the island, Trask had seen on the part of Jarrow a decided reluctance to arrive at anchorage before dark. There was no doubt about it. He had allowed the schooner to lag when she could have been driven ahead. Whether this was due to Jarrow's deliberate contrivance, or was the result of a tacit acceptance of Peth's dilatory ways in seamanship, Trask had no means of determining with accuracy. He could only draw conclusions.

It might have been that Jarrow was willing to overlook Peth's delays in order to avoid bringing on a new argument with the mate. And Jarrow might have been wise to avoid a resumption of trouble, for, as Peth had been openly insolent and had carried a chip on his shoulder all the way from Manila, it was just as well that the captain did not give him the satisfaction of a row.

But Trask blamed Jarrow for being too complacent in small things, which had encouraged Peth to insubordination. It would have been far better if the mate had been brought into place with a sharp and short encounter which would determine just who was master, than to continue strained relations which only allowed Peth to smoulder and feed his rising anger with growls and grumbles in the hearing of the crew.

There was no doubt that Jarrow was trying to smooth things out and avoid a direct clash. He dreaded unpleasantness in the presence of Locke. But to Trask the obvious delay in coming up to the island was only a small part of his growing fears that the situation aboard the schooner was worse than a mere temporary ill-feeling between the captain and the mate.

A decided change had come over the crew. They were strangely quiet, and when Trask or Locke or Marjorie came in sight, the men were full of covert looks and signals to each other with their hands for caution and whispers.

There was a feeling of tension, a sudden stiffening of demeanour once the anchor was down. It was not so much expressed as shown by repression. There was a soberness of purpose in the most trifling details of their duties, as if a crisis long expected had arrived.

This change in manner was best exemplified by Doc Bird. Trask had noticed that when serving the table he had a way of looking over his shoulder suddenly, or taking on a look of scared intentness at any unexpected sounds from the deck or in the cabin. Doc had become strangely alert, watchful of everybody, and nervous to the point of sudden shivering attacks. Trask ascribed Doc's actions to an unexplained coolness which had sprung up between the steward and Shanghai Tom, although it was quite possible Doc was aware of something of the nature which had given Trask a sense of disquiet, this undercurrent of insincerity, of hidden meanings, of an evil spirit lurking under the friendly relations of Jarrow and Dinshaw with the trio who had come seeking the island.

Considering these matters, Trask undressed and put on his pajamas. Then he opened the door of his room, and rolled into his bunk, purposely accentuating the creaking of the boards under his mattress so that any listener might be assured he had turned in for the night.

The hole cut in the upper part of Jarrow's door was open and dark. The captain, to all appearances, had gone to sleep, but Trask had plans for the night and did not care to take chances at having them upset.

There was a mild snoring from Dinshaw's room and despite the chafing of the schooner's gear and the patter of the water under her counter, she seemed deathly quiet after the interminable groaning of her timbers during the passage from Manila.

The swinging lamp over the cabin table was burning dimly, waves of its light washing into Trask's room like the lifting of a lazy tide, and whirling grotesque shadows up and down the bulkhead.

The lighted lamp stood in the way of Trask's carrying out his plan. He wished he had found some excuse for putting it out earlier. But he had not realized that it was to be left burning. He wanted to go out and do a little reconnoitering, but as the door of the main cabin leading forward was open, he had no way of leaving the cabin without being seen from the forecastle.

It was from the forecastle that he hoped to get some inkling of how the crew was getting on. Immediately after the anchor was down Trask observed that the crew had gone below, and, except for an occasional gruff call, or a joking sally, nothing had been seen or heard from them.

Trask was confident they had not turned in to sleep. There had been sounds of rough gaiety, promptly subdued, and a few bars of music on a mouth organ, checked abruptly. The scuttle had been closed, and Trask thought it queer that there should be a desire to shut themselves up, for while the evening was cool enough in the open, the temperature arose in a stifling way at any shutting off of the air currents.

Trask would have thought nothing of it if the crew had openly quarrelled, or engaged in skylarking, or had sat around and smoked and chatted quietly. But they appeared ominously furtive. And Trask knew that if there was anything sinister behind their skulking, Peth must have a hand in whatever was going on.

The lamp must be disposed of in a manner not to attract the attention of either the crew or those aft. He first thought of calling softly to Doc Bird and asking him to put out the light. But if Doc demurred, or declared that the light could not be extinguished except by order of Jarrow, Trask would have called attention to his own wishes and his plan would be balked.

Besides, Doc would undoubtedly want to talk, and Jarrow would thereby be disturbed and become watchful, and all hands aft be roused. If the light were put out at Trask's request, and later he was found prowling on deck, he could no longer maintain his character of being a person without suspicion of anything amiss aboard.

But if he put the light out himself, he could offer the plea that it prevented him from sleeping, and the same excuse could be given if he were later found outside for a little fresh air. If any of the crew did resent his presence forward, he would have proof that they were wary of being spied upon. That, if nothing more, would indicate to him that his suspicions were well founded.

He got out of his bunk with great care and struck a match. Then he stepped boldly into the cabin and turned down the lamp until the wick snuffed out the flame. With the match still burning in his hand, he went back to his room, thus establishing for any watcher the fact that he had returned to bed after the lamp was extinguished.

Waiting a while to make sure there would be no investigation as to why the light went out, he crawled out over the coaming of the door of his room. It was necessary that he keep low, for he was not sure whether there was one of the crew on watch aft. To any one looking through the cabin from the companionway Trask would be visible against the lantern hanging from a forestay if he walked erect in crossing the cabin.

Gaining the outer deck, he stood clear of the doorway and hugged the forward bulkhead of the cabin trunk, taking care not to mask the forward port-hole of the galley with his back. If Doc Bird had heard him crawling out, he might be of an inquiring turn of mind, in his present panicky condition, and explore with a knife through the open port.

Trask had in the jacket pocket of his pajamas matches and cigarettes, so that in case he were challenged he could assume a careless manner by preparing to have a smoke, and at the same time illuminate the face of any one he encountered.

He moved forward along the starboard bulwark, feeling his way with his bare feet, taking great pains not to stumble over any obstacle. He could make out the loom of the island over the starboard quarter, a black spot focussed in the all-pervading blackness of the night. Everything seemed to give promise of secrecy for him. The rasp of the boom-jaws, the swishing of coiled ropes on the pin-rails, and the chirping creak of the shrouds as the schooner bobbed and rolled on the lulling swells, concealed the slight sounds of his advance.

He stopped and looked aft every few steps, listening for noises in the cabin. He could see the faint outline of the mizzen boom and the upper edge of the cabin. His eyes, better adjusted now to the gloom, saw a black shape over the cabin roof. It startled him for a second, for he thought it might be Jarrow peering toward him, until he knew it for a roll of canvas which had been left there to spread as awning.

He went on, stopping when he felt the well of the deck rise as he approached the forecastle. Presently he saw a tiny point of light flare up and die away. Then he caught the spicy aroma of a native cigarette in the soft air charged with the acrid smell of new hemp, the resinous odour of the deck seams, the sweet reek of opium smoked by forgotten crews and the earthy flavour of the jungles close at hand.

The thought came to him that perhaps it was he who was exotic in the schooner. It might be for this reason that he was too ready to mistake normal things as evidences of a menace which did not exist. He wondered if this fact might not well account for the formless fears he had felt about Peth and the crew. Like a person who wakes in the night, to find the windows where they shouldn't be, his judgment, too, might be at fault, and affairs far better than he thought them.

Trask had no worries for himself. The pursuit of gold in untrammelled parts of the world was his business, and at times danger was but the thrill which went with the game. He knew that if he were the only passenger in the schooner he would very likely be in his bunk asleep instead of hunting trouble.

But he felt a responsibility. This wild project of taking a young woman in a schooner, with a crew of men who had all the outer aspects of rascals, and a mild madman, to hunt an island, was largely his own fault and Trask now realized it.

Locke was far too credulous, or rather incredulous. Like most Americans who have lived quiet lives and attended to their own business, he lacked imagination for dangerous possibilities in the motives of others. Such adventures as he had had were out of books, and he had taken it for granted that what he read was always improbable and impossible. Such people never believe in danger until they have a revolver thrust into their faces. And Locke had come aboard the schooner with a roll of yellow-backed bills so big that he could hold in his hand more wealth than all the ship's company together could earn in a year of honest labour.

Trask almost wished he had declined to go in with Locke on the trip to the island. He had been quite too easy-going about it all himself, neglecting to take precautions about Jarrow and the crew because he had been reluctant to forego the pleasure of Miss Marjorie's company. Trask had been exiled so long in far corners of the globe that he was strongly averse to giving up a single hour to business details which he might have with the American girl.

Then he knew that to tell Locke he did not care to go to the island and later to go by himself would have been sneakingly selfish. Now that they were embarked on the venture, he felt that he must do all he possibly could for the protection of his companions. He wished that he had demanded an investigation when he found his pistol missing. He moved forward with careful steps, knowing that there must be a man sitting on the forecastle head facing toward him, else he could not have seen the light from the cigarette.

The foremast and the boom were faintly visible in relief against the lighter shade of the sky, and knowing he might be seen above the bulwark, Trask moved away from the edge of the schooner, and drew near the base of the foremast, which offered better concealment. He was now but a few feet from the forecastle scuttle and could see it outlined by a dim pencilling of light. Voices reached him, but he was not able to distinguish any words.

Presently he heard wary footsteps ahead, and saw a figure rise up and go into the bows, marked by a faint, comet-like streak of light which must be the man's cigarette. The spot of light disappeared for a second and reappeared again in a swift, descending arc cut off by the bows. The smoker had thrown away his cigarette.

For several minutes Trask watched and listened. The man on the forecastle head coughed gently, and then came clumping aft, dropped to the main deck with a smack of bare feet, and drew the scuttle aside, to put his head and shoulders down.

"It's all right!" Trask heard him whisper, hoarsely. He recognized him as Shope. The light coming up through the scuttle illuminated the foremast above Trask's head in a manner disconcerting. Trask ducked down under the boom.

All was silence below, and then the creaking of the steps leading up, and the light below went out. There were sounds of men coming on deck, known to Trask by the rattle of the scuttle as incautious shoulders rasped it coming out, making the board rattle in its grooves.

There was a conference in guarded whispers, and someone started aft along the starboard side. Trask could make him out as he passed, and after he had disappeared against the blackness made by the fore bulkhead of the cabin there was a peculiar rattle along the deck in his wake.

Trask was now thoroughly alarmed. The crew could not be out on deck whispering and moving about with such secrecy with any good intent toward those who had made the voyage possible.

The rattle along the deck continued, and dropping to his hands and knees, Trask crawled to the starboard side. He encountered a small, hard line, like a lead-line, being paid out from the forecastle and carried aft by the man who had passed. Trask put his hand upon it and let it run through his fingers for a second.

There came a slight patter of rain and Trask made his way toward the cabin, not so much to avoid a wetting, as to be where he could alarm Jarrow and Locke if there appeared to be any necessity to investigate the actions of the crew.

It was all rather absurd, he thought. There was nothing especially sinister about sailors carrying a line aft. To demand what it was about and make himself known would only serve to make him ridiculous if the explanation proved to be the carrying out of some legitimate duty. Being quiet, with the vessel at anchor, was hardly to be condemned. And if it turned out that the crew were preparing trouble it was no time to show that they were being watched unless the danger were imminent.

He stepped into the galley and felt along the bulkhead for the row of knives he had seen in their leathern pockets. He pulled out a large one, judging its size by the thickness of its handle. It was a formidable weapon.

Dinshaw was still breathing musically. So far as Trask could tell, all hands in the cabin were asleep. He passed through with great care, smiling at the figure he would cut if he were challenged and found with a great knife in his hands sneaking about the cabin. He, rather than the crew, would be held guilty of some dangerous intention against the safety of the schooner.

The rain was now striking the cabin roof with sweeping gusts. It was not a heavy downpour, but a threat of more to come, the weak advance guard of an approaching deluge.

Ascending the companion, he put his head out far enough to see a shape moving at the taffrail, evidently a man bent over some task. Then it moved away to starboard, slowly, and Trask heard a gentle blowing, as one might make in clearing the nostrils of rain.

Trask now felt rather ashamed of himself. Instead of an attack on the cabin, the man who had come aft had gone about his business and departed. There was nothing to be alarmed about in that, surely.

So Trask went to the forward door and looked out on deck, putting the knife away in the galley without, however, attempting to insert it in the leather sheath. Then he stood in the doorway, and listened.

The man could be seen moving along the starboard side slowly. Trask caught a foreign sound, a gurgle which he at first mistook for rain water running from the scuppers. But the deck was scarcely wet and, besides, the sound was to starboard. Water running off would go to port, for the schooner was heeled a little in that direction.

Soon there was a rasping along the hull, and emboldened by the fact that the man who had brought the line aft was now well forward, Trask stepped to the bulwark and looked over the side.

At first he could see nothing in the blackness below, but a new flurry of rain came, and the drops striking the water hissingly made it slightly luminous, outlining a dark, formless mass close to the side of the schooner. It moved forward slowly, its progress coincident with the movement of the man going along the rail. Trask could see his head and shoulders against the fog-like sheen of the water over the bows.

At once the whole affair was made plain to Trask. The dinghy, which had been lowered from the after davits when the Nuestra anchored, was being stolen! The crew were pulling it forward by the line which the man had taken aft, and this man was keeping the boat clear of the schooner's side. The line evidently had been made fast to the dinghy's painter.

Here, indeed, was something which gave every appearance of being underhand work. With the Golden Isle only a few hundred yards distant, and all hands to go ashore in the morning, there could be no other reason for stealing the dinghy than a plan to visit the island under cover of darkness. The plan foreshadowed treachery. The crew sought some knowledge which they wanted before the other members of the expedition could be aware of conditions on the island.

Trask saw at once the purpose of the crew, although he had no way of knowing how they intended to gain any advantage to themselves unless they contemplated abandoning the Nuestra, or destroying it and those remaining aboard. He had no doubt the scheme was to learn whether or not there was gold, and so to act, in the event they found it in great quantities, that they would be assured of having it for themselves.

It was a wild idea, this going out in the night to hunt gold. But it was plain that the cupidity of the crew had been aroused by the prospect of a shining, yellow beach. But what was to Trask far more important, and fraught with danger to Marjorie, Locke, Dinshaw, Jarrow, and himself, was the knowledge that Peth, if not the leader of the enterprise, at least must be aware of what was taking place.

The rain came on now with steady, monotonous force, turning the sea into a boiling cauldron. Trask, drenched in the first minutes of the downpour, remained where he was, crouching under the bulwark with his head high enough to get the bulwark forward against the gray luminosity of the beaten water.

So concealed, if it could be called concealment, in the darkness of the schooner, he saw four figures go over the side, and heard them fumbling in the dinghy. They pushed off gently and rowed away in the direction of the island, amid the muffled click of oars. Before proceeding but a few yards the boat was lost to him in the welter of steaming water and all-enveloping blackness.

Trask suffered from a chill, but he remained where he was, wondering what could, or should, be done. Jarrow must be warned. The sky now turned lighter, being relieved of its burdened clouds, and the rain began to fall off, until it was merely a gentle trickle.

Dripping like a water spaniel returning to the shore, Trask turned in to the door of the main cabin, planning to rid himself of his wet clothing, get into some dry garments, and call Jarrow.

As he felt his way into the deeper gloom he heard a movement close at hand, and stopped, leaning against the bulkhead, just abaft of the galley. He saw that the light from outside marked the cabin door as a great rectangle in which a moving form could easily be seen from the inside.

"Who's that?" came a whisper.

"Who are you?" demanded Trask, whispering, but more boldly, and with something of defiance in his tone.

"Doc Bird, Mr. Trask," came the answer. "Fo' the lan' sake, what yo' all doin' out in the rain, man?"

"Keep quiet," said Trask, unpleasantly aware of rivulets racing down his heels. He followed the bulkhead straight aft, conscious that Bird was in the doorway of the cook's room, past Dinshaw's room, to the door of Jarrow's, which he opened softly.

"Captain Jarrow!" he called, in a low voice. "Captain Jarrow!"

There was no reply. He listened for the regular breathing of the sleeping captain. Then he went inside and felt along Jarrow's bunk. The sheet was rumpled and thrown back but Jarrow was not there.