Much of all this passed through Mary Vanton’s mind as she stood on the wide veranda of the beach house, alone. The water was now far too cold for bathing and the children had scattered to their own devices. It was a chilly, sunshiny, October day. Hull down on the restless horizon Mary could see a steamship moving almost imperceptibly westward. By nightfall she would be at anchor off Quarantine. That same night or the next morning her passengers would troop ashore and add themselves to New York’s millions. And even as she watched this liner creep along, not more rapidly than the minute hand of a watch, a thin plume of smoke on the eastern horizon announced the presence of another vessel. So they followed each other, day in and day out, going west, going east, seldom missing from the scene for an hour. More rarely you saw a great ship under full sail come up over the rim of the world, move past with curved white beauty, and then sink over the world’s rim again. XIV The vessel struck with the greatest suddenness and with such force that even above the roar of the wind and the thunder of the surf pounding at the foot of the dunes the people gathered in the Vanton house heard the dull crash and jumped to their feet. Dick Hand exclaimed: “What’s that!” Mary Vanton answered with the thought that was in all their minds: “A ship!” Her mind ran instantly to the children, absurdly, as if they were in danger. Seven-year-old Mermaid, the youngest, was in bed and was not likely to be awakened by sounds outside. Keturah and the two boys were with Richard Hand and herself. She spoke to the three of them with stern distinctness: “Children, whatever happens, you mustn’t leave the house. You mustn’t step off the veranda. The sea is up to the foot of the dunes.” She called the servant and governess and ordered them to keep to the house and to help her. Richard Hand was already at the telephone and calling the Lone Cove Station. “Hello, Tommy!” they heard him say. “A ship has struck just opposite the house. Wait a moment.” He lifted his head from the transmitter and asked: “Can you see anything?” “They’re sending up rockets,” replied Mary Vanton. She was at the window, the two boys crowding close to her to look out. “It’s certain,” Richard Hand said into the telephone. “We can see her distress signals.... All right.” He hung up the receiver with a crash and went to the window to see for himself. The utter darkness of the angry night was broken, at a distance of perhaps 400 yards from where these onlookers were clustered, by a stream of rockets, which lit the blackness faintly for an instant and then expired, making the night seem darker than before. The illumination was not sufficient to disclose much of the vessel but she seemed to be a schooner or ship with three masts. Not a large craft; something of about 2,500 tons and something more than 200 feet long, Richard Hand surmised.