"Oh, do come, dad. It goes back to the southwest regularly."
He joined in the watch. The needle was pointing north in obedience to the sound-waves created in the room. Suddenly, it swung round nearly half the circumference of the dial.
"Hush!" he said. They listened intently, but the roar of wind and water was too deafening. They could hear naught else. He went to the southwest point of the glass dome, but the lantern was so blurred with rivulets of water that he could see nothing save a tawny vastness where the light fell on the flying spindrift.
To make sure, he tested the auriscope again, and with the same result.
"A vessel is approaching from the southwest," he announced, gravely. "Evidently she is whistling for help. I hope she will not attempt to approach too near the reef. I must have a look out."
He put on an oilskin coat and tied the strings of a sou'wester firmly beneath his chin.
The small door of the lantern opened towards the Bay, so he had no difficulty in gaining the gallery. The girls watched him forcing his way against the wind until he was facing it and gazing in the direction of the Scilly Isles.
"Perhaps some poor ship is in danger, Connie," whispered Enid. "It makes me feel quite selfish. Here was I, thinking of nothing but my own peril, yet that little machine there was faithfully doing its duty."
"It was not alone in its self-abandonment. We shall never know, dearest, how much father suffered when he sent us off with a jest on his lips. I am sure he thought the lantern would be blown away."
"And he with it! Oh, Connie!"