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Rh "But we can't leave Sally with those thugs loose on the island."

"That's just what I'm afraid of. The old devil and the chap you licked are watching us, you can bet, and they won't try to hoard tonight. Better hold the boat for hostage, steam to the Cape, get Sally, Dick, and Yeo, then beat around to Rainbow Bay. We can get reinforcements from the North Star and search the island thoroughly, or wait for them. Their provisions are on board and they've no way of escape, so they'll have to give themselves up in the end.

"Benson, do you understand the dark and devious ways of a steam-engine?"

"Are you insultin' me, Captain," the bosun replied, with injured dignity. "Do you think I'm that treacherous and degraded? Jack Beam here onct lowered himself by flirtin' with one of the damned things, on some ugly hulk of a Fruit Steamer. But he saw the light and reformed, swearin' never to ship again 'cept on an honest, God-fearin' square-rigger."

"Beam, can you run it?"

"I'll take a try at it, sir."

Steam was already up, the rascals evidently having planned departure, and a little later, Carlotta from the porthole saw the darkling shores apparently moving. She rushed on deck to welcome her friends, but instead of the imperturbable MacAllister she found Captain Brent at the wheel. And then she repeated the old tricks of her Standish régime—"Worse 'n nine drownin' cats all fightin' in a sack," the bosun described it—but it did her no good, and she subsided