We were wet, shivering, and exhausted. The night was dark, the wind cold and of spray. Cavarly ordered us to scatter, and each find dry sand among the dunes, if he could, to cover himself with. What with the darkness and the shrieking wind, at twenty feet from your next neighbour you were quite alone, seeing and hearing nothing of him. Presently I was stumbling among sliding sand heaps; and after I had found a sheltered spot, I did not care where it was, but scraped off the wet top sand and, burying myself in the dry beneath, there lay shaking and gasping with the chill till I fell asleep. The morning broke with the grey, driving clouds still over us. We got away, without looking to see whether the cruisers on the other side were waiting or not, every man with sand on his hair and clothes, a silent and pale-faced company. Few had slept for the wet and cold. I was in the boat with Cavarly, and saw him gazing at the distant shore and wrinkling his brow and pulling his beard. A thin, sallow man it was, named Henry, who pulled the bow oar and kept his head turned over his shoulder. Presently he unshipped his oar, got up and looked ahead. “Cap'n,” he said, “beggin' your pardon, that's Redwood, North Ca'lina.” “I reckon like enough,” growled Cavarly. “Happen I was bo'n over there,” said Henry. “Drove the mules to a mule windlass, what they haul seines with, on that same beach. That's Tommy Todd's boathouse, an' he lives back o' them pitch pines.” “Sit down,” said Cavarly, “an' pull for Tommy Todd's.” The men gave a faint cheer and shouted to the boat behind. But Cavarly looked no more cheerful than before. We drew to the shore, where an old weather-beaten boathouse stood, the mule windlass before it, two uprights with a monstrous spool between; and we straggled wearily up the beach, seeing in the distance a long, shambling house among the pitch pines, with smoke rising from the chimney. There Henry beat upon the door, opened it to a sound within, and we streamed into a low, smoky room where a man and a woman sat at breakfast. A fat negro woman was frying bacon on a stove, and an old negro man sat bent over in a chair. “Hiop! Jemima!” cried the man at the table. “Four, six, eight! Hol' on! Too many.” “Don' you know me, Tommy Todd? I'm Pete Henry.” “Maybe you be. Jemima! You're sociable, Pete Henry. Ten, twelve! Been gettin' acquainted, ain't you! Fourteen, fifteen! Jemima!” Cavarly introduced himself and made Mr. Todd more calm, for he seemed an excitable man and sarcastic. He was square-set, but bony, and wore a thin, gray chin beard and a faded black coat with dangling tails.