"Let's occupy ourselves with the things our generous gaolers have been kind enough to send us, then," suggested Audrey. "We'd better carry them up to our shelter."
Copplestone went down to the things which the boat's crew had deposited on the beach—a couple of small packing-cases, a bundle of wraps and cushions, and some books, magazines and newspapers. He picked up a paper with a cry which suggested a discovery of importance.
"Look at that!" he exclaimed. "Do you see? A Scotsman! Today's date!
And here—Aberdeen Free Press—same date!"
"Well?" asked Audrey. "And what then?"
"What then?" demanded Copplestone. "Where are your powers of deduction? Why, that shows that the Pike was somewhere this morning where she could get the morning papers from Aberdeen and Edinburgh—therefore, she's been, as I suggested, somewhere on the Scotch coast all night. It's now noon—she's a fast sailer—I guess she's been within sixty miles of us ever since she left us."
"Isn't it more pertinent to speculate on where she'll be when we want to find her?" asked Audrey.
"More pertinent still to wonder when somebody will come to find us," answered Copplestone as he shouldered one of the cases. "However, there's a certain joy in uncertainty, so they say—we're tasting it."
The joys of uncertainty, however, were not to endure. They had scarcely completed the task of carrying up the newly-arrived stores to the shelter which they had made in an angle of the rocks when Vickers hailed them from a spur of the cliffs and waved his arms excitedly.
"I say, you two!" he shouted. "There's a craft coming—from the south-west. Come up! There!" he added, a few minutes later, when they arrived, breathless, at his side. "Out yonder—a mere black blot—but unmistakable! Do you know what that is, either of you? You don't? All right, I do—ought to, because I'm a R.N.V.R. man myself. That's a T.B.D., my friends!—torpedo-boat destroyer. What's more, far off as she is, my experienced eye and sure knowledge tell me exactly what she is. She's a class H. boat built last year—oil fuel—turbines—runs up to thirty knots—and she's doing 'em, too, just now! Come on, Copplestone—more stuff on this fire!"
"I don't think we need be uneasy," said Copplestone. "Miss Greyle thinks that her mother will have raised a hue and cry after the Pike. This torpedo thing is probably looking round for us. She—what's that?"