"The sky's clear," I suggested.
He laughed, though without humor.
"A sky isn't always clear because there're no clouds in it, Mr. Jack."
"But what do you expect, Gates? We don't have storms at this season!"
"You're right, sir. But once in a long while there'll be a howler, and that's what the barometer is trying to tell us now. As we have only harf a crew on each yacht I think we'd better make a bee-line in. 'Twill take us twenty miles north of where we were, and those fellows carn't see us."
I never disputed conditions of weather with Gates, so the course was changed and we started on our run to land, which he thought might be reached by dark. In this he was right, for as the sun, like a strangely weird greenish ball, touched the horizon our prow, leading the Orchid by half a mile, entered the protecting waters of Big Cove.
Just at this moment Bilkins dashed up from the cabin, looking scared and yelling:
"He won't stay quiet, sirs; I can't make him!"
We would have thought a delirium had seized the big black had not he then appeared from the same doorway, regarding us with an air of rationality. I have never seen a smile more broad, or more expressive of relief. It simply radiated happiness, and Tommy, staring at him, began to hum a song that had cheered us many a time in the trenches.
"By Jingo, Tommy," I cried, "we'll name him that!"