CHAPTER I 



The Isles of the Indies 



In the cold gray light of a mid-November evening our sailing 

 ship lay becalmed. Evanescent wisps of fog swirled about her 

 masts and melted softly into the blank grayness beyond. It 

 was very quiet. Only the faint lap-lap of tiny waves at the 

 waterline and the mournful cry of a gull, far distant and muf- 

 fled by the mist, disturbed the silence. Close together on the 

 slack sheet lines long rows of glistening moisture drops hung 

 listlessly or dropped pattering on the sodden deck. I listened 

 intently, straining my ears for the sound of ship's bells or fog 

 horn, but heard nothing save a block at the masthead that was 

 creaking a trifle. Once the distant gull broke the stillness again, 

 but then even this plaintive sound ceased after a moment and 

 was lost. 



For five days we had been drifting like this, moving slowly 

 through the empty fog, drifting from nothingness to nothing- 

 ness, and on into the blank grayness again, sails barely filling 

 or hanging limp for hours at a stretch. While I listened a faint 

 breeze, smelling vaguely of salt marshes and decaying seaweed, 

 stirred momently, straightened the drooping sheet lines, and 

 then died as it was bom. The spoked wheel rocked once, 

 groaned as though inexpressibly weary, and then became im- 

 movable. 



Disgusted, I knocked the ashes from my pipe, shook the 

 water from my dripping oilskins and then opened the com- 

 panionway slide. A breath of warm air came rushing out 

 redolent of the good smell of cooking food and filled with 

 the muffled anthem-like strains of Sibehus' majestic "Fin- 



