"Laugh all you want to," said the sailor, sullenly; "it's true—ev'ry word of it!"
"Mebbe you think it, friend," answered a big, good-natured fisherman; "but it's well known that shipwrecked folks go crazy sometimes, an' imagine strange things. Your mind seems clear enough in other ways, so I advise you to try and forget your dreams about flyin'."
Rob now stepped forward and shook hands with the sailors.
"I see you have found friends," he said to them, "so I will leave you and continue my journey, as I'm in something of a hurry."
Both sailors began to thank him profusely for their rescue, but he cut them short.
"That's all right. Of course I couldn't leave you on that island to starve to death, and I'm glad I was able to bring you away with me."
"But you threatened to drop me into the sea," remarked the little sailor, in a grieved voice.
"So I did," said Rob, laughing; "but I wouldn't have done it for the world—not even to have saved my own life. Good-by!"
He turned the indicator and mounted skyward, to the unbounded amazement of the fishermen, who stared after him with round eyes and wide open mouths.