The arm was set and splinted; the body of Brown fetched from the forepeak, where it lay still and cold, and committed to the waters of the lagoon; and the washing of the cabin rudely finished.  All these were done ere midday; and it was past three when the first cat’s-paw ruffled the lagoon, and the wind came in a dry squall, which presently sobered to a steady breeze.

The interval was passed by all in feverish impatience, and by one of the party in secret and extreme concern of mind.  Captain Wicks was a fore-and-aft sailor; he could take a schooner through a Scotch reel, felt her mouth and divined her temper like a rider with a horse; she, on her side, recognising her master and following his wishes like a dog.  But by a not very unusual train of circumstance, the man’s dexterity was partial and circumscribed.  On a schooner’s deck he was Rembrandt or (at the least) Mr. Whistler; on board a brig he was Pierre Grassou.  Again and again in the course of the morning, he had reasoned out his policy and rehearsed his orders; and ever with the same depression and weariness.  It was guess-work; it was chance; the ship might behave as he expected, and might not; suppose she failed him, he stood there helpless, beggared of all the proved resources of experience.  Had not all hands been so weary, had he not feared to communicate his own misgivings, he could have towed her out.  But these reasons sufficed, and the most he could do was to take all possible precautions.  Accordingly he had Carthew aft, explained what was to be done with anxious patience, and visited along with him the various sheets and braces.

“I hope I’ll remember,” said Carthew.  “It seems awfully muddled.”

“It’s the rottenest kind of rig,” the captain admitted:  “all blooming pocket handkerchiefs!  And not one sailor-man on deck!  Ah, if she’d only been a brigantine, now!  But it’s lucky the passage is so plain; there’s no manoeuvring to mention.  We get under way before the wind, and run right so till we begin to get foul of the island; then we haul our wind and lie as near south-east as may be till we’re on that line; ’bout ship there and stand straight out on the port tack.  Catch the idea?”

“Yes, I see the idea,” replied Carthew, rather dismally, and the two incompetents studied for a long time in silence the complicated gear above their heads.

But the time came when these rehearsals must be put in practice.  The sails were lowered, and all hands heaved the anchor short.  The whaleboat was then cut adrift, the upper topsails and the spanker set, the yards braced up, and the spanker sheet hauled out to starboard.

“Heave away on your anchor, Mr. Carthew.”

“Anchor’s gone, sir.”

“Set jibs.”

It was done, and the brig still hung enchanted.  Wicks, his head full of a schooner’s mainsail, turned his mind to the spanker.  First he hauled in the sheet, and then he hauled it out, with no result.