“I’ll take your word for it,” answered Miss Belcher, calmly.  “You have timed it well, Captain Branscome.”

“Under Providence, ma’am,” the Captain corrected her, and called to me to take the wheel while he fetched out his chart and unrolled it for her inspection.  “We are running straight down upon the northern end of it, and our best anchorage (if I may suggest) lies to the south’ard—­in Gow’s Creek, as they call it.”

He laid a finger on the chart.

“We rely upon you, sir, to choose.”

“I thank you, ma’am.  If (as I doubt not) we find plenty of water there, it will be the best anchorage in this breeze; not to mention that this Gow’s Creek runs up, as we are directed, to within a mile and a half of the No. 3 cache.  If you agree, ma’am, I have only to ask your instructions whether to coast down the east or the west side of the Island.  The wind, you perceive, serves equally well for both.”

Miss Belcher considered for a moment.

“The Keys lie to the west of Gable Point, here.  By taking that side we can have a look at them on our way.”

“Right, ma’am.  Harry!”—­he turned to me—­“bring her nose round to sou’-west and by south, and stand by for the gybe.”  He hauled in the main-sheet and eased it over.  “Now, see here, lad,” he called to me sharply as the little vessel yawed:  “where were your eyes just then?”

“I was taking a look at the land-fall, sir,” I answered truthfully.

“Then I’ll trouble you to fix your mind on the lubber’s-mark and hold her straight.  That’s discipline, my boy, and in this business you may want all you can learn of it.”

It was not Captain Branscome’s habit to speak sharply.  I turned my attention to the card, conscious of a pair of red ears.

The sky brightened, and within an hour, as we ran down upon it at something like eight knots, the Island began to take shape.  A wisp of morning fog floated horizontally across it, dividing its shore-line from the hills in the interior, which, looming above this cloudy base, appeared considerably higher than, in fact, they were.  The shore itself along the eastern side showed almost uniformly steep—­a line of reddish rock broken with patches of green, which we mistook for meadows (but they turned out to be nothing more or less than sheets of green creepers matted together and overhanging the cliffs).  At its northern extremity, upon which we were closing down at an acute angle, the land dropped to a low-lying, sandy peninsula with a backbone of rock almost bare of vegetation, and beyond this we saw the white surf glittering around the Keys.

Our course gave them a fairly wide berth; and at first I took them for a continuous line of sandbanks running in a rough semicircle around the low spit which the chart called Gable Point; but as we drew level they broke up into islets, with blue channels between, and at sight of us thousands of sea-birds rose in cloud upon cloud, with a clamour that might have been heard for miles.  One of these banks—­ the northernmost—­showed traces of herbage, grey in colour and dull by contrast with the verdure of the Island.  The rest were but barren sand.