"What is it a sign of?" Harry asked impatiently.
"Didn't I jes' tell you? It's a sign that this 'ere craft will turn bottom up afore reachin' port, an' we're in big luck to have the Trade Wind's yawl hangin' at the davits."
"Well, we'll fix that mighty sudden!" And Jim ran forward as he spoke; but the heavy hatch was more than he could lift unaided.
"It won't do any good to turn it now, for the mischief has been done," Bob said in a lugubrious tone; "but you boys had better go for'ard an' help him set it ship-shape."
Harry and Walter did as was suggested; but they did not move with alacrity, for the old sailor's superstitious fears had plunged them again into deepest despair.
"Don't act as if you'd lost your best friend," Jim said in a whisper when the two came forward. "It's only a mess of sailor's nonsense."
"But he says the sign always comes true!" Walter replied mournfully.
"That don't make it so. If every fore-hatch what got turned upside down sunk a ship there wouldn't be many vessels afloat. He's all in a heap through bein' starved so long, an' most likely doesn't know more'n half of what he's talkin' about."
The boys refused to be comforted. It was but natural that they should believe the eldest member of the party, and he an old sailor, rather than the youngest, more especially as the ominous prediction seemed to be in keeping with all that had happened since they boarded the brig.
It was a mournful-looking group which clustered around the wheel when the sun descended behind the waste of waters, for even Jim could not appear cheerful while his companions were so gloomy; and as the darkness settled down over brig and sea Bob repeated the story of his sufferings in the open boat, until the sighing of the light wind through the rigging sounded in their ears like the moaning of some unearthly visitant.