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 at Puerto Locombia, or by the living God, if you so much as show a nose outside your doors, I'll clap the whole lot o' you into irons and carry you back to New York harbour!"

It meant nothing to the weak and bewildered girl, after what she had gone through, but it wounded some inner and ever guarded part of her to see that McKinnon made no effort to intervene, that he had not stepped in and spoken for her.

It was not until his steadying glance met hers that she began to realise he was holding something in reserve, that he had his reasons, that he was plotting out some new line of procedure, and with this discovery came a renewed memory of the hopelessness of their position, of the dangers confronting them, of the last avenue of delivery that had been cut off from them. The blasphemy and truculence of a ship captain meant nothing to her; the satyr-like exultation of Ganley meant nothing. She knew that she had been fighting for life, or something almost as worthy as life. And she knew that the fight had by no means approached its end.