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 there,” he replied, “and what are they to this? Besides, Taori, it is no idle journey I wish to make, for it is in my mind that it was from the reef of Marua those gulls came that fought the gulls of Karolin, they were seeking a new home. Why?”

“The gulls only know,” replied Dick, “and then there are the bad men whom some day I mean to slay, but not now, for we have not enough men, not a spear with us.”

“We have the speak sticks of the papalagi,” said Aioma, “and I can use them. Le Moan taught me, but the bad men are out of sight; in this business we need not draw nearer to Marua than we are now from Karolin, or only a little. It is the reef I wish to see and what may walk on it, for gulls do not leave their home just because the wind blows hard or the sea rises high. They have been driven, Taori, and what has driven them—greater gulls, or some new form of man—who knows? But I wish to see.”

Dick pondered on this. He had only intended to sail the schooner a short way, to feel her moving on the outer sea, to handle her; with the eating had come the appetite, with the handling of power the desire to use it. He had no fear about getting back, Karolin lagoon light would lead them just as it had led him and Katafa, and his mind was stirred by what Aioma had said about the gulls.

What had happened to drive them away from their home? He had never thought of the matter before in this light, thinking of it now he saw the truth in the