THE EPISODE OF THE DEAD MAN WHO SPOKE I will not trouble you with details of those three terrible days and nights when we drifted helplessly about at the mercy of the currents on our improvised life-raft up and down the English Channel.

The first night was the worst.

Slowly after that we grew used to the danger, the cold, the hunger, and the thirst.

Our senses were numbed; we passed whole hours together in a sort of torpor, just vaguely wondering whether a ship would come in sight to save us, obeying the merciful law that those who are utterly exhausted are incapable of acute fear, and acquiescing in the probability of our own extinction.

But however slender the chance--and as the hours stole on it seemed slender enough--Hilda still kept her hopes fixed mainly on Sebastian.