"So was I, sir," said the captain sharply. "It's a mercy that ugly-looking yellow monkey of a chap was not smothered in that cask. My word! he must be a plucky fellow!" "Or too stupid to have grasped the danger," said Brace. The captain nodded. "Well, you gentlemen," he said, "I'm going to stop on deck till we're a few miles farther off the shore; so I shall keep Mr Dellow company till it's Lynton's watch, and then I shall turn in. Good night, gentlemen, good night." "Good night," said the brothers in a breath. "If you hear it come on to blow before morning, you needn't be surprised, for I think we're going to have a bit of wind. Young Uncle Sam was right about sending a boat ashore with him. She'd never have made the shore, nor the brig again." Brace looked sharply round, trying to pierce the darkness, but in vain. CHAPTER NINE. THE MIGHTY RIVER. Before morning the "Jason" was pitching and tossing in a heavy sea which had risen very suddenly, and for the next week, whenever the brothers cared to face the rain, wind, and spray, they found Captain Banes on deck looking very grim and anxious and evidently in no humour for entering into conversation. The officers and crew too looked worn and harassed with hard work and the buffeting they had received; but it was evident that they took it all as a matter of course, and were perfectly confident about the ability of the brig to weather a far worse storm. It was quite bad enough, and prolonged till the pitching of the vessel became very wearisome; but there was one thing which always met the eyes of the brothers when they went on deck, and that was the figure of Briscoe tucked up in the best shelter he could find, beneath bulwark or behind deckhouse, clad in glistening black waterproof; and smoking a big cigar. He always saw the brothers as soon as they appeared on deck, and if they nodded to him he was quick to respond, but he never forced his company upon them; and it was so too in the cabin, for he was quiet and unobtrusive, speaking readily when spoken to, but only to subside at once when the conversation flagged. "What has become of his inquisitive organ, Brace?" "That's what I was thinking: he seems quite a different man." The storm was over at last, and one morning, as the brig was running due west under a full press of sail, it suddenly struck Brace that the water over the side was not so clear as it had been an hour before when he was leaning over the bulwark gazing down into the crystalline depths, trying to make out fish, and wondering how it was that, though there must be millions upon millions in the ocean through which they were sailing, he could not see one. "We must be getting into water that has been churned up by the storm," thought Brace; but just then the second mate came up and he referred to him. "Water not so clear?" he said. "No wonder; we're right off the mouths of the Amazon now." "So far south?"