"I have not lighted it at all," said she.
Hazel stood aghast. "What have I done?" he cried. "Duty, manhood, everything demanded that I should light that beacon, and I trusted it to you."
Then Helen's attitude of defiance melted away. She began to cower, and hid her blushing face in her hands. Then she looked up imploringly. Then she uttered a wild and eloquent cry, and fled from him like the wind.
CHAPTER XLVII.
THAT cloud was really the smoke of the Springbok, which had mounted into air so thin that it could rise no higher. The boat herself was many miles to the northward, returning full of heavy hearts from a fruitless search. She came back in a higher parallel of latitude, intending afterward to steer N.W. to Easter Island. The life was gone out of the ship; the father was deeply dejected, and the crew could no longer feign the hope they did not feel. Having pursued the above course to within four hundred miles of Juan Fernandez, General Rolleston begged the captain to make a bold deviation to the S.W., and then see if they could find nothing there before going to Easter Island.
Captain Moreland was very unwilling to go to the S.W., the more so as coal was getting short. However, he had not the heart to refuse General Rolleston anything. There was a northerly breeze. He had the fires put out, and, covering the ship with canvas, sailed three hundred miles S.W. But found nothing. Then he took in sail, got up steam again, and away for Easter Island. The ship ran so fast that she had got into latitude thirty-two by ten A.M. next morning.
At 10h. 15m. the dreary monotony of this cruise was broken by the man at the mast-head.
"On deck there!"
"Hullo!"