"Very well," agreed Cabot resignedly. "I suppose you know what is best to be done, but it seems to me that we are arranging for a very lonesome cruise on regular Box and Cox lines."
As White had no knowledge of Box and Cox he did not reply to this grumble, but, rolling up in his blankets until he resembled a huge cocoon, almost instantly dropped asleep.
During the next four hours Cabot, shivering with cold and aching with weariness, but never once allowing his tired eyes to close, remained at his post. Through the black night, and over the still darker waters, he guided the flying schooner according to the advice of the unstable compass card that formed the only spot of light within his whole range of vision. At the same time, knowing how little of skill he possessed in this new line of business, and not yet having a sailor's confidence in the craft that bore him, he was filled with such a fear of the night, the wind, the leaping waters, and a thousand imaginary dangers that his hardest struggle was against an ever-present impulse to arouse his sleeping comrade. But he would not yield, and finally had the satisfaction of coming unaided to the end of his watch.
"Midnight, and all hands on deck," he shouted, and White, springing up, asked:
"What's happened? Anything gone wrong?"
"Nothing yet," replied Cabot, "but something will happen if you leave me at this wretched tiller a minute longer."
"I won't," laughed the other. "It will only take me half a minute to get an eye-opener in shape of a cup of cold tea, and then you can turn in."
When Cabot was at length free to seek his bunk he turned in all standing, only kicking off his boots. The very next thing of which he was conscious was being shaken and told that breakfast was ready.
It was broad daylight; the sun was shining; the breeze had so moderated that White had been able to leave the schooner to herself with a lashed helm while he prepared breakfast, and as Cabot tumbled out he wondered if he had really been anxious and fearful a few hours earlier.
All that day and through the following night our lads kept watch and watch while the "Sea Bee" travelled up the coast. Early on the second morning they passed Flower Cove, and from this point White headed directly across the Strait of Belle Isle, which, here, is but a dozen miles in width. Then, as Newfoundland grew dim behind them, a new coast backed by a range of lofty hills came into view ahead; and, in answer to Cabot's eager question, White said: