The rest of my day was lonely, for the beautiful youth, probably by malevolent design, was kept busy between decks. Mr. Tubbs danced attendance on Aunt Jane and Miss Browne, so assiduously that I already began to see some of my worst fears realized. There was nothing for me to do but to retire to my berth and peruse a tattered copy of _Huckleberry Finn_ which I found in the cabin. At dinner, having the Honorable Cuthbert at my elbow, it was easier than not to ignore every one else. The small keen eyes of Mr. Tubbs, under his lofty and polished dome of thought, watched us knowingly. You saw that he was getting ready to assume a bless-you-my-children attitude and even to take credit somehow as match-maker. He related anecdotes, in which, as an emissary of Cupid, he played a benevolent and leading role. One detected, too, a grin, ugly and unmirthful, on the unprepossessing countenance of Captain Magnus. I was indifferent. The man my gaiety was intended for sat at the far end of the table. I had to wipe out the memory of my wet eyes that afternoon. Directly dinner was at an end, remorselessly he led the Honorable Cuthbert away. I retired to Huckleberry Finn. But a face with a scar running to the eyebrow looked up at me from the pages, and I held colloquies with it in which I said all the brilliant and cutting things which had occurred to me too late. I was thus engaged when a cry rang through the ship: "Land ho!" IV THE ISLE OF FORTUNE I dropped my book and ran on deck. Every one else was already there. I joined the row at the rail, indifferent, for the moment, to the fact that to display so much interest in their ridiculous island involved a descent from my pinnacle. Indeed, the chill altitude of pinnacles never agrees with me for long at a time, so that I am obliged to descend at intervals to breathe the air on the common level. The great gleaming orb of the tropic moon was blinding as the sun. Away to the faint translucent line of the horizon rolled an infinity of shining sea. Straight ahead rose a dark conical mass. It was the mountainous shape of Leeward Island. Everybody was craning to get a clearer view. "Hail, isle of Fortune!" exclaimed Miss Browne. I think my aunt would not have been surprised if it had begun to rain doubloons upon the deck. "I bet we don't put it over some on them original Argonaut fellers, hey?" cried Mr. Tubbs. Higher and higher across the sky-line cut the dark crest of the island as the freighter steamed valiantly ahead. She had a manner all her own of progressing by a series of headlong lunges, followed by a nerve-racking pause before she found her equilibrium again. But she managed to wallow forward at a good gait, and the island grew clearer momently. Sheer and formidable from the sea rose a line of black cliffs, and above them a single peak threw its shadow far across the water. Faintly we made out the white line of the breakers foaming at the foot of the cliffs.