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Rh completely encircled his jaws. The stranger couldn't see the colour of his eyes, but they looked cunning enough, even at that distance.

Between pauses for salivary punctuation, he inquired:

"Now atter you gents has settled this among yerselves, supposin' ye let us sit in. To get down to cases, if I might ax ye, what might be the compensation fer all this risk to our  souls?"

The explanation of the leader was now inaudible, but it didn't satisfy the second, a burly chap with a pugilist's crouch and build, and a frightful scar, which the firelight revealed, forking across his flat, challenging features.

"We gotta split better'n that," he growled surlily.

"But Mr. Huntington owns the boat, I'm promoting the job. You three can spilt a third three ways, if you know what that means."

"You mean he gets a third, you get a third, and we divvy what's left?"

And the gesture of his thumb, as he indicated the spoils-men, reminded the spectator of some sign of the vendetta.

"You're a lightning calculator, Pete, but you don't invest any capital or brains, you see."

"Mebbe, but you sail without us, then, hey Swedie?"

The last one addressed, the bullet-headed roustabout in the sleeveless red undershirt, with enormous biceps and a close-cropped head, merely returned his usual "Ay tank so," and lay down on the sands as if indifferent to, or confident of, the outcome.

The man called MacAllister apparently yielded the point,