"It's possible," Carroll laughed.
"Besides, you can drive one of those big Siwash craft as hard as you can this sloop; that is, so long as you keep the sea astern of her."
"Yes; I dare say you can. After all, you hadn't any passengers on the occasion I was referring to. I suppose you feel you have to consider them?"
Vane colored slightly.
"Naturally, I'd prefer not to land Mrs. Marvin and the child in a helpless condition; and I understand they're feeling the motion pretty badly."
Kitty Blake made her appearance in the cabin entrance, and Vane smiled at her.
"We're going to give you a rest," he announced. "There's an inlet close ahead where we should find smooth water, and we'll put you all ashore for a few hours until the wind drops."
There was no suspicion in the girl's face now. She gave him a grateful glance before she disappeared below with the consoling news.
A quarter of an hour later Vane closed with the beach, and a break in the hillside, which was dotted with wind-stunted pines, opened up. While the two men struggled with the mainsheet, the big boom and the sail above it lurched madly over. The sloop rolled down until half her deck on one side was in the sea, but she hove herself up again and shot forward, wet and gleaming, into a space of smooth green water behind a head. Soon afterward, Vane luffed into a tiny bay, where she rode upright in the sunshine, with loose canvas flapping softly in a faint breeze while the cable rattled down. They got the canoe over, and when they had helped Mrs. Marvin and her little girl, both of whom looked very wobegone and the worse for the voyage, into her, Vane glanced around.
"Isn't Miss Blake coming?" he asked.