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They put out the yawl and he jumped in. When he had gone we watched him climbing aboard the other schooner.

“Now for New York!” exclaimed McLaughlin, the boatswain, and master of the crew in the absence of any pilot.

“Do we sail all night?”

“To get there by morning we’ll have to.”

All sails were then hoisted, and we bore away slowly. Darkness fell. The stars came out. Far away the revolving light of the Highlands of Navesink was our guide. Far behind, the little pilot-boat which had received Germond was burning a beacon for some steamer which had signaled a blue light. Gradually this grew more and more dim, and the gloom enveloped all.

We sat with subdued spirits at the prow, discussing the dangers of the sea. McLaughlin, who had been five years in the service, told of accidents and disappearances in the past. Once, out of the night had rushed a steamer, cutting a boat such as ours in two. One pilot-boat that had gone out two years ago had never returned. Not a stick or scrap was found to indicate what had become of her fifteen men. He told how the sounding of the fog-horns had chilled his heart the first year of his service, and how the mournful lapping of the waters had filled him with dread. And as we looked and saw nothing but blackness, and listened and heard nothing but the sipping of the still waters, it did seem as though the relentless sea merely waited its time. Some day it might have them all, sailor and cook, and where now were rooms and lockers would be green water and strange fishes.