Page:The Gates of Morning - Henry De Vere Stacpoole.pdf/236



T was the ship’s bell.

Tahuku had struck it in idleness, just as a child might, but the unaccustomed sound coming just then seemed to Aioma a response to the words of the other. But he said nothing. Taori had chosen his path and he must pursue it.

At noon the northern horizon still showed clear and unbroken by any sign of land, yet still the wind blew strong and still the schooner sped like a gull before it.

Tahuku, who had been cook and who knew where the stores were kept, prepared a meal; and whilst the crew were eating, Aioma took the place of the lookout in the bow. Nothing—neither land gull nor trace of land. Nothing but the never ending run of the swell bluer from the southern drift that showed still the contrast of the deeper blue.

A road leading nowhere.

The canoe-builder came up to where Dick was standing in the bow.

“Taori,” said Aioma, “we have not lost our way, there runs the current and there Karolin still shows us her light, we have come faster than the big canoes of forty paddles and so have we come since morning, yet Marua is not in sight.”