The next night, which it seemed would never come, for the day, locked as the captives were in their room, seemed endless, finally closed in.  Mark, Jack and the professor were anxious to know whether the mate would pay them another visit.  As for Andy, Tom and Bill, while they were interested in the ship, and wanted to be free from the power of the mutineers, they did not lose any sleep over it.

Shortly after midnight, there came again the peculiar knock, and the mate entered the room.  He seemed much excited over something, and, as soon as the portal was securely closed he said to Professor Henderson: 

“Is there an island any where near here where men could live for a time?”

“What do you mean?” asked the scientist.  “Do you want us to desert the ship and leave these scoundrels in charge?”

“Nothing of the sort,” replied the mate, who, had said his name was Jack Rodgers.  “But first answer my question.  A great deal may depend on it.”

Seeing Rodgers was in earnest, the professor looked over some maps and charts, and announced that they were within a few hundred miles of a group of islands.

“When would we reach them?” was Rodgers’s next question.

Mr. Henderson made a few rapid calculations on a piece of paper.

“At the present rate of sailing,” he said, “we should be there about ten o’clock to-morrow.  That is, provided the ship does not slacken speed or increase it.”

“There is no danger of either of those two things happening,” said the mate.  “Tony is too afraid of the machinery to do anything to it.  So you may safely figure that our speed will continue the same.”

“Then I can guarantee, with all reasonable certainty,” the professor said, “that about ten o’clock to-morrow we will be less than a mile from the islands.  They are a group where friendly natives live, and where many tropical fruits abound.  One could scarcely select a better place to be shipwrecked.  But I hope the plans of Tony and his friends do not include landing us there.”

“No, nothing like that,” the mate answered.  “Quite the contrary.  But I had better be going.  I will try and see Mark some time to-morrow.  Tony does not mind when I speak to him.”

With this Rodgers left the captives, as he heard some of the sailors moving about and did not want to be discovered.  The professor and the boys wondered what the mate’s plan might be, but they had to be content to wait and see.

The night passed without incident.  About nine o’clock the next morning the mate came to the door of the room where the professor and his friends were prisoners.  He made no secret of his approach, but knocked boldly.

“Tell Mark I want to see him,” he said, as the professor answered.  “All of you keep quiet,” he added in a whisper.  “There may be good news soon.”

Mark slipped from the room.  He followed the mate to the upper deck which, at that time was deserted as all the sailors were in the dining room eating, which practice they indulged in as often as they could.