Page:The Gates of Morning - Henry De Vere Stacpoole.pdf/282

 and then came cautiously towards the higher coral where his outlook post was; literally on hands and feet he crawled, inch by inch, till the sea came in view and then he crawled no longer. He stood erect.

Far off on the breezed-up sea the schooner close-hauled was standing away from the island.

Rantan could scarcely grasp the fact before his eyes. She had been making for him and now she was standing away.

She had not been searching for him, then. Was she after all the Kermadec or had he been mistaken?

Her shape, her personality, that patch on the sail—well what of that? Other ships had patched canvas besides his schooner. He had surely been mistaken.

As she dwindled dissolving in the wind, his hungry eyes followed her.

How fast she was going, faster than the Kermadec could sail close-hauled.

He watched her till she was hull down, till her canvas showed like a midge dancing in the sea dazzle, till it vanished taken by the round world into the viewless.

Then he came back to the trees.

Just as the ship had gone from the sea, so had his dream ship gone from his mind, taking hope with her, leaving him to his utter nakedness. He went to the old canoe that he had abused and vilified in his hour of triumph; the sun had enlarged the crack, the forward outrigger pole had worked loose with the tossing in the swell, there was no paddle.

Yet she could talk to him, telling him of Nanu and