Jarrow looked disgustedly at him, and gave orders to Peth to have the dinghy lowered.
"Are we going ashore now?" asked Marjorie.
"No, ma'am," said Jarrow. "We can't trust the weather in a hole like this. May have to wear and git out. All hands stick close aboard to-night."
"In the morning," said Trask.
"In the mornin," echoed Dinshaw, but he seemed disappointed and scarcely able to wait for the time of going ashore.
Trask got out his prospecting bag, and after supper they all sat on the poop and talked and joked about what was in store for them the next day—all except Dinshaw, who, like a child, had gone to bed early, that morning would come the quicker.
Then Jarrow followed suit. Locke, Trask, and Marjorie remained for an hour's chat in the darkness after which Trask was left to himself to finish his cigar.
"Good luck, Mr. Trask," Marjorie had whispered, as she went down the companion, and he touched her hand playfully.
He remained in his deck chair for some time, with only the friendly glow of his cigar to keep him company, wondering how it would all end. For all his impatience to get to the island, now that it was lying there within stone's throw behind the whisper of the waves washing its beach, he was sorry they had arrived so soon. For if there should be no gold on the island, it would be a case of turning back, and a couple of days more would see them in Manila, and Marjorie Locke homeward bound with her father. But if there should be gold! Well, that might give this voyage a new aspect, it might alter his own fortunes in such way that he could tell Marjorie Locke that he loved her.
Of course, if Dinshaw's discovery proved to be only a pocket, or no gold at all, that would put an end to things. But if there was gold in quantities that would pay for mining it, his own share might be a good stake in life. His future hung on the old man's story, that is his future considered with Marjorie Locke, and Trask had now come to the point of not being able to consider his own future alone, although he did not realize that wholly. It was a thought he kept in the back of his mind for fear it might turn out to be only a dream.