"It's gettin' well on to sunset," Mr. Peters suggested, "an' I was so mixed up this mornin' that I ain't willin' to swear the work in the lantern was done 'cordin' to the rules an' regerlations. It won't do any harm to have a look at the lamp." "Go ahead, Sammy, though I'm allowin' that we did our duty as keepers before we started out to help them poor creeters," and Captain Eph followed his first assistant, while Sidney kept close at the latter's heels. So far as the lad could judge, there was no decrease in the strength of the wind, nor could he see anything to betoken the end of the gale, yet Captain Eph confidently announced that the "backbone of the blow was broken," and the weather would be fair next morning. "I hope you're right, Cap'n," Mr. Peters said, as he examined critically the apparatus, "for it ain't dead sure that we mightn't fetch away from the wreck quite a lot of stuff that would come in handy to us now an' then." "That may be, Sammy; but the question is whether we'd get enough to pay us for pullin' the dory out there an' back while the sea is runnin' high." Now, for the first time since the keepers returned from their dangerous errand of mercy, did Sidney think of the motor boat, and he asked concerning her. "She's stove for good this time, Sonny," Mr. Peters replied, "an' if we hadn't gone ashore in her jest when we did, all my work would have been thrown away. I'm allowin' that you'd have hard work to find two of her timbers; but the motor lays there on the rocks in what I'd call pretty fair shape, considerin' how it was ripped out of her." "I wouldn't waste many tears on her, Sonny, for, take it all in all, we've come out of this 'ere gale a good deal better than we had any right to expect," Captain Eph said, as if believing the lad would feel badly because his boat had been destroyed. "Don't think I'd be so foolish as that, sir," Sidney said with a laugh. "Of course I'd rather we had her whole and sound; but she didn't begin to be of as much value in a place like this, as the dory, and if we had put her into the house, taking your boat out, those poor fellows down-stairs would not now be alive." "That's the way to look at it, Sonny," Captain Eph cried cheerily. "Now we'll start the light, an' then be ready for Uncle Zenas' call. I reckon he'd expect us to come down when supper was ready, even if the kitchen was stacked full of half-drowned sailors." As if in answer to the keeper's remark, Uncle Zenas' head appeared just above the floor at the head of the stairs, and he said in a hoarse whisper: "Two of your shipwreckers are hoppin' 'round down there lively as chickens; but the others are still asleep. What 'ere we doin' to do 'bout supper?" "I reckon we'd better have it the same as usual, Uncle Zenas," the keeper replied. "It won't do any harm if them as are still in bed get wakened, for they're likely needin' food as much as sleep."