"And you were about ten or eleven, with a freckly face," pursued Miss Baird calmly. "You were a horrid little wretch in those days, because I distinctly remember you laughing at me when the halliard jammed and I couldn't get the sail either up or down." "Guilty, Miss Baird," said Peter. "I apologize. Give me a chance to make amends and I'll be all over it." "I will," agreed the girl. "You may take me for a sail in Bulonga Harbour; but you mustn't be selfish, like Mr. Preston and Mr. Anstey. You will let me take the tiller, won't you?" Peter gave the required promise. He felt highly pleased with himself. Anstey was evidently in disfavour because he had underrated Olive's capabilities as a helmswoman. In addition, the Third Officer would be fairly busy while the _West Barbican_ was in harbour, as the steelwork had to be taken out of the hold. Reminiscences of youth spent in the West Country, too, were mutual and sympathetic bonds between the Wireless Officer and the girl. No wonder he was feeling highly elated. "What sort of a place is Bulonga?" asked Olive. "Haven't the faintest idea," replied Peter. "Never heard of the show until a day or two ago. Don't expect a second Durban, Miss Baird. If you do you'll be disappointed. I shouldn't be at all surprised if it's a pestilential mud-hole. By Jove, it's close on eight bells, and it's my watch." Half an hour later Mostyn "took in" a message from Durban addressed to Miss Baird. It contained the brief announcement that Mr. and Mrs. Gregory--Olive's relations to whom she was on her way--were returning to England in three days' time, and that Olive's passage-money home was lying at the Company's offices at Durban. CHAPTER XX An Eventful River Trip "What a one-eyed crib!" exclaimed Anstey, as the _West Barbican_ slowly approached the low-lying coast in the neighbourhood of Bulonga. Mostyn nodded in concurrence. The outlook was dreary in the extreme. All there was to be seen was a squalid collection of galvanized-iron huts rising above a low, sandy spit; a few gaunt palms; a line of surf--not milk-white, but coffee-coloured--and a background of sun-dried hills. The whole coast seemed to have been scorched up by the sun. Brown and drab colours predominated. The foliage was of a sombre drab-green narrowly approaching a dull copper colour. Even the sea in the vicinity of the harbour had lost its usual clearness and appeared to be charged with a muddy sediment. "Any sign of the pilot, Mr. Anstey?" inquired Captain Bullock. The "S International", the signal for a pilot, had been flying from the topmast-head for the last hour, as the _West Barbican_ cautiously closed with the inhospitable-looking coast, but there were no signs of activity ashore.