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As I was hurrying down to the beach, I saw the schooner getting under way, and heard the boat’s crew imperiously calling out to me to hasten. I broke into a run, and was almost at the water’s edge when I turned to find Bo panting at my side. I stopped to see what she wanted, and when she forced a little parcel into my pocket I suddenly remembered the present of which Hinton had spoken.

“Good-bye, Bo,” I cried, wringing her little fist in mine. “Many thanks for the fish-hook, which I shall always keep in memory of our travels.”

All the way out to the schooner I seemed to feel the package growing heavier and heavier in my pyjama pocket, and the suspicion more than once crossed my mind that it was no fish-hook at all. Feeling loath to determine the matter before the men, who must needs have seen and wondered at the transaction from the boat, I kept down my curiosity until I could satisfy it more privately on board. Then, as the captain and I were watching the extraordinary antics of the Beautiful Man (who had rushed down to the beach and thrown himself into a native canoe, in the impossible hope of overtaking us, alternately paddling and shaking his fist demoniacally in the air), I drew out the package and cut it open with my knife. In a neat little beadwork bag (which still conserved a lurking scent of monkey), and carefully done up in fibre, like a jewel in cotton wool, I found a shining treasure of gold and silver coin.