"No words were said as we came in. I sat against the bulwarks, almost afraid to move, like a man awakening to consciousness after a long siege of fever. A little forward of my position, Wilbur rose to his feet. He hadn’t spoken or touched food since that tragic hour under the reefs two nights before; had spent most of his time below decks, locked in a tiny stateroom, and had come out only in the last few minutes, as if in response to the nearing sounds of the land. He stood at the rail, a figure wrapped in silence and immobility, watching them berth the sampan. Then, without a glance in our direction, he walked to the gangway and stepped ashore. On the bulkhead he paused for a moment irresolute, turning and gazing across the harbour. His form stood out plainly against a bright light up the street. It had lost those lines of vigour and alertness; it was the figure of a different and older man. A broken figure, that could never again be the same.... "A moment later he had lurched away, vanishing suddenly in the darkness of a side street. Three days afterwards, we heard that he had taken the boat for Singapore. He hasn’t been seen or heard of in this part of the world since that day. "When he had gone, that night at the bulkhead Lee Fu approached me; we crossed the deck of the sampan, and stood for a long while silent at the harbour rail. "’Thank you, Captain’ said he at last ’As I foresaw, it has been supremely interesting. For your part, I hope you feel repaid?’ "’It’s quite enough to be alive, just now’ I confessed without shame ’I want to see a chart of that locality, Lee Fu. I want to find out what you did’ "’Oh, that? It was not much. The gods were always with us, as you must have observed. As for the rest of it, I know that region pretty well’ "’Evidently.... Did the _Speedwell_ fetch up among those same reefs, or to leeward of them?’ "’The _Speedwell_? Captain, you did not believe my little pleasantry? We were nowhere near the wreck of the _Speedwell_, at any time—as Captain Wilbur should have known, had he retained his mental perspective’ "I smiled feebly. ’Well, I didn’t know it. Tell me another thing, Lee Fu. Were you bluffing, there at the last, or was there really no passage through the reef?’ "’So far as I am aware, Captain, there was no passage. I believe we were heading for solid rock when we came into the wind’ "The answer surprised me. ’Would you have piled us up’ I asked ’if Wilbur hadn’t given in?’ "’That is a hypothetical question. I knew perfectly well that I should not be forced to do it. I was only afraid lest, in the final anguish, Captain Wilbur might lose his seaman’s judgment, and so might wait too long. That, I confess, would have been unfortunate. Otherwise, there was no especial doubt or danger’ "’I’m glad to hear it!’ I exclaimed, with a shudder of recollection ’It wasn’t apparent at the time’