"He might do something, perhaps," Wilfrid said; "but I am quite sure he would not alarm my father and mother about it. He is the last sort of fellow to do that." CHAPTER IV. A ROW ON SHORE. While Wilfrid and the Allens were talking they were walking briskly in the direction of their landing-place. They had arrived within a hundred yards of it, when a party of four men who were lying among a pile of timber got up and came across towards them. They were rough-looking fellows, and James Allen said, "I do not like the look of these chaps. I think they mean mischief. Look out!" As he spoke the men rushed at them. James Allen gave a loud shout for help and then struck a blow at a man who rushed at him. The fellow staggered backwards, and with a fierce exclamation in Portuguese drew a knife. A moment later Allen received a sharp stab on the shoulder, and was knocked to the ground. The other two after a short struggle had also been overpowered and borne down, but in their case the robbers had not used their knives. They were feeling in their pockets when the step of a man approaching at full speed was heard. One of the robbers was about to run off, when another exclaimed: "You coward! It is but one man, which means more booty. Out with your knives and give him a taste of them as he comes up!" A moment later the man ran up. The leader stepped forward to meet him, knife in hand; but as he struck his wrist was grasped, and a tremendous blow was delivered in his face, hurling him stunned and bleeding to the ground. With a bound the new-comer threw himself upon two of the other men. Grasping them by their throats he shook them as if they had been children, and then dashed their heads together with such tremendous force that when he loosened his grasp both fell insensible on the ground. The other robber took to his heels at the top of his speed. All this had passed so quickly that the struggle was over before Wilfrid and the Allens could get to their feet. "Not hurt, I hope?" their rescuer asked anxiously. "Why, Mr. Atherton, is it you?" Wilfrid exclaimed. "You arrived at a lucky moment indeed. No, I am not hurt that I know of, beyond a shake." "Nor I," Bob Allen said. "I have got a stab in my shoulder," James Allen answered. "I don't know that it is very deep, but I think it is bleeding a good deal, for I feel very shaky. That fellow has got my watch," and he pointed to the man who had been first knocked down. "Look in his hand, Wilfrid. He won't have had time to put it in his pocket. If you have lost anything else look in the other fellows' hands or on the ground close to them."