“What do you mean, sir?” asked Edwards eagerly.

“After the light disappeared the compass kept on varying.  The stars were hidden.  There is no telling just where we were headed for some time.”

“Then we might be fifty miles from the spot we aimed at.”

“Hardly that,” said the navigator.  “We could guide her to some extent by the direction of wind and waves.  If it was volcanic we ought certainly to have sighted it by now.”

“Always some electricity in volcanic eruptions,” said Trendon.  “Makes compass cut didoes.  Seen it before.”

“Where?” queried Carter.

“Off Martinique.  Pelee eruption.  Needle chased its tail like a kitten.”

“Are there many volcanoes hereabouts?” somebody asked.

“We’re in 162 west, 31 north, about,” said Barnett.  “No telling whether there are or not.  There weren’t at last accounts, but that’s no evidence that there aren’t some since.  They come up in the night, these volcanic islands.”

“Just cast an eye on the charts,” said Billy Edwards.  “Full of E. D.’s and P. D.’s all over the shop.  Every one of ’em volcanic.”

“E.  D.’s and P. D.’s?” queried the paymaster.

“Existence doubtful, and position doubtful,” explained the ensign.  “Every time the skipper of one of these wandering trade ships gets a speck in his eye, he reports an island.  If he really does bump into a rock he cuts in an arithmetic book for his latitude and longitude and lets it go at that.  That’s how the chart makers make a living, getting out new editions every few months.”

“But it’s a fact that these seas are constantly changing,” said Barnett.  “They’re so little travelled that no one happens to be around to see an island born.  I don’t suppose there’s a part on the earth’s surface more liable to seismic disturbances than this region.”

“Seismic!” cried Billy Edwards, “I should say it was seismic!  Why, when a native of one of these island groups sets his heart on a particular loaf of bread up his bread-fruit tree, he doesn’t bother to climb after it.  Just waits for some earthquake to happen along and shake it down to him.”

“Good boy, Billy,” said Dr. Trendon, approvingly.  “Do another.”

“It’s a fact,” said the ensign, heatedly.  “Why, a couple of years back there was a trader here stocked up with a lot of belly-mixture in bottles.  Thought he was going to make his pile because there’d been a colic epidemic in the islands the season before.  Bottles were labelled ‘Do not shake.’  That settled his business.  Might as well have marked ’em ‘Keep frozen’ in this part of the world.  Fellow went broke.”

“In any case,” said Barnett, “such a glow as that we sighted last night I’ve never seen from any volcano.”

“Nor I,” said Trendon.  “Don’t prove it mightn’t have been.”

“I’ll just bet the best dinner in San Francisco that it isn’t,” said Edwards.