THE CALL OF THE SEA
on 'em; and she don't tell. No, siree! she holds her secrets fast."
"But didn't the people on the island know?" the boy queried.
There was a comical look in the old man's eyes as he regarded his questioner.
"Say, sonny," he said, "you don't think there's trolley-cars runnin' and department stores on every little two-by-four dump in the South Seas!"
"I thought there might be a few natives," Dave suggested.
"Well, sometimes you find a bunch of them stoppin' on an island, but we didn't see anything livin' there except a few turtles and sea-birds that knew nothing and cared less about how the Hatteras got there. You never know what luck is comin' your way when you're a sailor. It might be our turn to get piled up on a rock after we leave here to-night at high water."
Somebody on deck called to the mariner. Dave, with a curious feeling, watched him clamber
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