"No: I was trying to make out our course. The pa.s.sage has wound off to the right, and we're going east."

"Of course it would zigzag and turn about," said Mike wearily; "but we're in deeper water here, for we don't seem to go near any small rocks."

"No; but we're going by plenty of big ones on the left. The current runs close to them, I'm sure, though it's ever so much wider now. I believe I could almost have touched either side with the boat-hook a bit ago; now I can only touch one side."

"It's more ripply, too, now, isn't it?"

"Ever so much: seems to boil up all about us, and you can't see the bright specks sailing about so fast. The top of the water was as smooth as gla.s.s when we were in the great lugger."

"That's a sign we are near the sea, then," said Mike, with more confidence in his tones.

"Yes, and I don't like it," said Vince thoughtfully.

"Why?"

"Because I've been thinking that there must be another way out; and knowing all about it, as they do, they'll be waiting at the mouth of this horrible zigzag place along which we're dodging all this time, and catch us after all."

"Oh, Cinder!" cried Mike pa.s.sionately, "don't say that: it would be too hard. It may be too dark for them to see us if we lie close and don't make a sound. And look," he said joyfully: "we really are close to the sea now, for we're going due south."

"Due south it is," a.s.sented Vince, as if he were standing at a wheel steering. "Yes, I suppose you're right, for I can hear the sound of surf. Listen."

"Yes, I can hear," replied Mike; "but it sounds smothered-like."

"Rocks between us, perhaps. Now then: only whispers, mind!--close to the ear. Don't let's lose our chance of getting away by telling them where we are. I say!"

"Yes."

"If there was a boat anywhere near us, could you see it?"

Mike turned his eyes to right and left before answering:

"Sure I couldn't on that side, and I don't think I could on this."

"That's what I felt, and if we're lucky we'll escape them after all.

Now then, silence, and let's get the oars across and each take his place on the thwarts, ready to row hard if we are seen."

Each from long practice felt for the thole-pins and placed them in their proper holes; then, softly taking up their oars, they laid them right across the boat, with handle standing out on one side, blade on the other, and waited in silence, with the boat gliding on.

At the end of about a quarter of an hour, during which minute by minute they had expected to be swept out into open water where the great Atlantic tide was rolling along by the solitary island, Mike whispered,--

"I say, the boat has turned quite round more than once. Doesn't that account for the stars seeming different?"

"No, because we can tell we are sometimes going forward and sometimes back."

"But look! we're going north now."

"Yes, I know we are," said Vince; "and I'm beginning to know how it is."

"Well, tell me. It's so horrible to be puzzled like this."

Vince was silent.

"Why don't you speak?"

"Because I was thinking. Ladle, old chap, we've gone through too much, what with the seals' cave, and being caught and then put down in that stifling hole over the gunpowder. We're both off our heads--in a sort of fever."

"I'm not," said Mike shortly. "You are, or else you wouldn't talk such stuff."

"I talk such stuff, as you call it, because my father's a doctor, and I've heard him tell my mother about what queer fancies people have when their heads are wrong."

"Two people couldn't be queer in the same way and with the same things.

What's the good of talking like that?"

"Very well: you tell me how it is. I can't understand it, and the more I try the more puzzled I am. It's horrible, that's what it is, and I feel sometimes as if we had been carried away by the tide to nowhere, or the place where the tides come and go in the hollows of the earth."

"We shall be out at sea directly, and then we shall be all right."

"No, we shan't be out at sea directly, and we shan't be all right; for we've got into some horrible great whirlpool."

"What!" cried Mike excitedly. "A whirlpool?"

"Yes, that's it; and we're going round and round, and that's why it is that we are sometimes looking south and sometimes north."

"But you don't think--if it is as you say--that at last we shall be sucked down some awful pit in the middle?"

"I don't know," said Vince. "I can't think properly now. I feel just as if my head was all shut up, and that nothing would come out of it. I say, Mike!"

There was no reply, for Mike was gazing wildly up at the stars, trying to convince himself of the truth or falsity of his companion's words; but he only crouched lower at last, with a feeling of despair creeping over him, and then he turned angrily, as Vince began to speak again, in a low, dreamy voice.

"That's it," he said: "we are going round and round. I wish we'd had some more of old Jarks' dinner, and then gone to sleep quietly in our bunks. We couldn't have been so badly off as we are now."

"Then why did you propose for us to escape?"

"Because I thought we ought to try," said Vince sharply, as he suddenly changed his tone. "There, it's of no use to talk, Mike. We're in for it, and I'm not going to give up like a coward. I don't know where we are, and you don't; but we're in one of those whirls that go round and round when the tide's running up or down, and we can't be any worse off than we are now, for there are no rocks, seemingly."

"But the middle--the hole."

"They don't have any hole. Why, you know, old Joe sailed us right across one out yonder by the Grosse Chaine, and we went into the little one off s.h.a.g Rock. It's one like that we're in, and I daresay if it was daylight we could see how to get out of it by a few tugs at the oars, same as we got out of that one when we went round and round before. Oh, we shall be all right."

Mike did not speak, for the words seemed to give him no comfort.

"Do you hear, Ladle?" continued Vince. "If we had been likely to upset, it would have been all over with us long ago; but we go on sailing round as steadily as can be, and I feel sure that we shall get out all right.

What do you say to lying down and having a nap?"

"Lie down? Here? Go to sleep?" cried Mike in horror. "I couldn't."

"I could," said Vince. "I'm so tired that I don't think I could keep awake, even if I knew old Jarks was likely to come and threaten me with a pistol. But, I say, Ladle, that wretch shot at us twice. Why, he might have hit one of us. Won't he have to be punished when we get away and tell all about him?"

"Yes, I suppose so--if ever we do get away," said Mike sadly.