‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I guess I am of opinion _that_ Mr Torin was by a considerable way the coolest and the silentest cuss I ever struck, and I’ve had experience; but with it, mind you, he was the most reckless devil that ever let in to make the universe hum. He wasn’t long out of some mess or other--woman, I heard--and likely enough--poor beggar!’--and Mr Denver heaved a sigh of smoke that brought a stupefied mosquito down from the ceiling. Presently he resumed. ‘He was a long, good-looking chap, with a don’t-care look, and one of those short, fair beards that grow on so many of you Britishers--going a bit grey--and an extraordinary strong man, thick through, and long in the limb. He was going down to Madeira, to fetch one of the South African boats for a shooting trip. We three used to mess together, you know, and got pretty thick,--Kinjan blowing around and spreading himself, Torin smoking and drinking, and now and then nodding his head, and I laying up and figuring them out--not for professional reasons, but because it’s kind of got to be a habit of mine, and they were two of the queerest bugs. “Not alone in their glory,” I thought to myself, but, beyond a grunt of appreciation, said nothing; the oyster was fairly open now. ‘Well, one evening about four bells,--while we were making down pretty near in to the Morocco coast, and about a hundred miles top side of Mogador,--I was leaning over the port rail aft, snuffing up the phosphorus, and admiring at the right down smartness of the skipper, shoving in shore on a real reefy coast, when there came an everlasting jolt, and before I could get in the thin end of a cuss, I guess I was treading water, and blowing like a grampus, forty yards from a fast-sinking ship. It wasn’t any good going back--that was clear--she wouldn’t be above water another five minutes, so I lit out and shoved for the shore,--a long white streaky line about a quarter of a mile off, with a blamed current setting me off it. I had to get there, or bust, and I _got_, but it was stiff going, and when I had made the sand I was as badly roasted as a leg of pork. ‘I easied a bit, and lay up with my legs in the water, though the tide running out soon left them high and dry. By and bye, I came round, and concluded to prospect along that shore, and see if any other wreckage had come to hand. It was pretty dark, but the sands were easy going, and there was a moon just getting up. I guess I hadn’t gone above a few hundred yards when I saw something white, about the height of a man’s figure, rising out of the sand a short way off. When I got nearer I saw it _was_ a man, Torin himself, leaning on an oar and looking down at his legs, which were quite bare.