“Arrah! Go way wid you! Tell me twinty men can’t get away from anywhere if it’s any sinse they’ve got. Cap’n Forbes could have got us ashore long ago if he’d been wantin’ to. It’s talk he does about gittin’ stuck in the weed! What’s a lot of weed? You can cut through it, can’t you? Faith, the rale trouble is Cap’n Forbes ain’t wantin’ to go, an’ he’s the only wan here with any seafarin’ since and any git up and git about him--unless your young man is after havin’ some.” “Mr. Howard said we could get away if we could get a boat and compass and----” “Oh! Sure, you’ll have to be havin’ a boat and some instruments to guide her, an’ it’s none so aisy to foind boats here. It’s me own opinion that the cap’n has destroyed all he found, so it is. As for compasses and such like, sure the cap’n has thim right enough locked away in his storehouse, even though he kapes them mighty secret. He don’t want to go himself and, be the same token, he don’t want any wan else to go. He moightn’t be such a big man if he was ashore, so he moightn’t! But you and your friends can get away--if Cap’n Forbes don’t prevent.” Freed from the restraint of Dorothy’s presence, the conversation on deck had grown even more animated than before. Howard and Jackson could scarcely answer one question before half a dozen more were plumped at them. Evidently, thirst for news of the world had not died out in the members of the colony. Howard noticed, however, that Forbes himself soon drew aside from the rest and engaged in earnest talk with Joe and Bill, evidently questioning them in regard to the Queen and her passengers, and that later he devoted himself particularly to drawing out Jackson. Finally he came toward Howard. “I guess your throat’s pretty dry, Mr. Howard,” he said, “and if you’ll come down to my cabin, I’ll see if I can’t find something to irrigate it with.” Howard willingly accepted the invitation. From all he had heard it was obvious to him that this puppet king had resolutely set his face against any member of his colony leaving the wreck-pack, and it was highly necessary to discover whether he would go so far as to oppose any attempts of the newcomers in that direction. If a contest was to come, the sooner Howard knew it, the better. Forbes led the way to his cabin and pushed forward a chair. “Choose your own poison, Mr. Howard,” he offered hospitably, indicating a sideboard loaded with bottles. “We have pretty nearly everything there is. A single steamer last month brought us more than we could drink in a lifetime. What I have here doesn’t represent half her selection. There is beer in the ice-box over in that corner, if you prefer it.” Upon Howard’s accepting the beer, his host set half a dozen bottles on the table, adding one of whiskey for himself.