The boat pulled close under the bows of the American cruiser, on its way to the schooner. The count noticed a war-ship’s boat ready manned at the gangway. From the schooner came faint sounds of men laboring. They had already begun to open the hatches. Half-way to the schooner a noise as of a swimmer caught the count’s attentive ear. “What is that?” he asked the young officer. At the word of command the men stopped rowing. Scarcely fifty yards away appeared a man’s head; he was making rather feeble progress through the water. The boat was quickly brought alongside the swimmer and the man hauled on board. A lantern was held up to his face. It was pale and haggard. The man was almost exhausted. The count noticed that the swimmer’s face was much swollen and discolored, as if from a blow. Even in the tropical air his teeth chattered and speech was nearly impossible. The count took off his own cape and wrapped it about the trembling figure. Then the boat pulled for the schooner, several hundred yards away. The officer and three men scrambled on board. Two small lighters were lying alongside the “Talofa,” and a score of “blacks” were making ready to discharge her cargo. The count asked a hurried question. The young officer in his party saluted and answered in the affirmative, pointing to a bundle under his arm. The boat waited until a fluttering flag rose slowly to the peak of the main gaff. It was too dark to distinguish the markings, but the count knew that the situation had been saved. The “Talofa” was under the protection of his navy’s flag. The count had hardly cleared the gangway before the “Sitka’s” boat rounded to under the schooner’s stern and shot alongside. “If Captain Scott has sold out to his countrymen,” the count exclaimed to himself, “he will find it difficult to deliver the goods.” At the dock he alighted. The rescued man was supported up to the hotel between two sailors. Dry clothes were provided him and from his medicine chest the count administered a sleeping draught. Once snugly wrapped in blankets in one of the rooms of the count’s suite, and a native boy sleeping across the only exit, the count felt sure that the stranger would be on hand in the morning to explain the mystery of why a white man was swimming from the “Talofa” toward the “Sitka,” his face bruised and himself half exhausted. It would be worth all the trouble he had taken to know. The count yawned. It was nearly midnight, and in the tropics one must be an early riser, for the heat of the morning sun does not conduce to refreshing sleep. He dismissed the sailors who had aided him. Then he shut his door and threw himself down on his couch to think. After several minutes, he rose and penned two notes. Sealing them, he called one of the attendant natives. “Take this one at once,” he directed; “the other,” he added to himself, “can wait until early to-morrow morning.” The native bowed and disappeared upon his errand. CHAPTER VI THE “TALOFA’S” CARGO