good for you if her condition is serious. This is a man and not a snake, and he must have come off of another wrecked boat, even though there has been no storm. He can help us carry Valerie, since he’s strong enough to wriggle up the face of a cliff. Pull yourself together while I talk to him. He must speak English, French, Spanish, German, Russian, or some other"
The next moment I almost went down on my knees thanking God, although the new arrival was definitely of the sneering and supercilious order.
"I see you speak practically every language," he said, too suavely. "Don't spend time naming any more of them. I speak all of them myself, but since you and your friend speak English usually, let us stick to that. I have a boat—not wrecked—I was moved to investigate this rock, which seemed, as you might put it, 'not quite right.'
"My yacht will take care of all of you nicely, just as soon as you can board her"
I hated him, from the start. But Gibbs was crazy and Valerie perhaps dying, and all of us expecting no future but slow death; so one can easily imagine how glad I was. I'm a man of the world, hardened, stoical, sophisticated; I could die, I wouldn't beg for life, I could take it as it came. . . .
We were saved! We were saved!
I could have kissed his feet, whether I hated him or not. I could have run around in circles, laughing and crying.
I went over and touched Gibbs' arm, and he was shaking and shivering with a nervous fit, and that helped me to cover up my own emotion.
"Get hold of yourself, man!" I said to brace him. "Valerie will get over what you did to her, I hope. We need you to help with her, and to tell the others, and—Gibbs, we'll sleep on board a ship!"
But did I say it was a night of horror? We told the others, yes.
Lisa and Jones, who had been cook on Gibbs' yacht, were hysterical with joy.
But it was too late for Galen, who had been mechanic on the yacht.
We almost fell over him, on the other side of the rock, in Valerie's hide-away—a place where Galen had never bothered to go. He lay in the moonlight with his face turned up and his throat stretched, and so much blood had run out of him that he had a shriveled look. And at that there were only blood-smears—not really much blood. That must have been because of the hunger and thirst. His throat was like Valerie's, but so very much worse, as though with Galen someone had had plenty of time . . .
I looked at Gibbs with more distaste than I have ever looked at any man. And then—in his eyes I read a blank amazement that had the look of utter, if drunken, innocence. Well, a drunk may commit murder and know nothing of it—even two or three murders sometimes. Yet—Gibbs looked a bit like a little boy accused of breaking a window he hasn't been near. Well, it would all have to be thrashed out later. We had to get on the yacht, and take care of Valerie. Tomorrow I will go on with this.
Tomorrow?
BY MY watch, which, being waterproof, has never stopped, it is tomorrow. By optical evidence, it still is night. Either the watch is bewitched, or these waters through which we sail, and the sky over us as well—or all of us.
Valerie lives. She is weak, but improving. We all had a ghastly kind of meal on board the strange yacht, which should have been breakfast by my watch. The food consisted of one dish, of which our host alone partook with much gusto. I don't care for meat at breakfast, and while
