Abigail Becker chanced at that time to be in her hut with none but her young children. Her husband was absent on the Canada shore, and she was left the sole adult occupant of the island, save the light-keeper, at its lower end, some fifteen miles off. Looking out at daylight on the beach in front of her door, she saw the shattered boat of the Conductor, east up by the waves. Her experience of storm and disaster on that dangerous coast needed nothing more to convince her that somewhere in her neighborhood human life had been, or still was, in peril. She followed the southwesterly trend of the island for a little distance, and, peering through the gloom of the stormy morning, discerned the spars of the sunken schooner, with what seemed to be human forms clinging to the rigging. The heart of the strong woman sunk within her, as she gazed upon those helpless fellow-creatures, so near, yet so unapproachable. She had no boat, and none could have lived on that wild water. After a moment's reflection she went back to her dwelling, put the smaller children in charge of the eldest, took with her an iron kettle, tin teapot, and matches, and returned to the beach, at the nearest point to the vessel; and, gathering up the logs and drift-wood always abundant, on the coast, kindled a great fire, and, constantly walking back and forth between it and the water, strove to intimate to the sufferers that they were at least not beyond human sympathy. As the wrecked sailors looked shoreward, and saw, through the thick haze of snow and sleet, the red light of the fire and the tall figure of the woman passing to and fro before it, a faint hope took the place of the utter despair which had prompted them to let go their hold and drop into the seething waters, that opened and closed about them like the jaws of death. But the day wore on, bringing no abatement of the storm that tore through the frail spars, and clutched at and tossed them as it passed, and drenched them with ice-cold spray,--a pitiless, unrelenting horror of sight, sound, and touch! At last the deepening gloom told them that night was approaching, and night under such circumstances was death.